Measuring emotional distress in diabetes
Research type
Research Study
Full title
A characterisation of measures of diabetes distress in the context of socioeconomic deprivation.
IRAS ID
146541
Contact name
Martin Dempster
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Queen's University Belfast
Research summary
Emerging evidence has shown that among patients with diabetes, emotional distress arising from their diabetes (diabetes distress, DD) is common. Moreover, it can impact on their blood sugar control and other important clinical parameters. Researchers have developed questionnaires that allow for quick measurement of a person's level of DD and have shown that a high score on these scales is related to worse blood sugar control. Unfortunately, these scales were developed in a relatively affluent population and little is known about how clinically useful this scale is in a more poor, deprived population. Therefore, we aim to recruit a study population that is enriched with people who are less affluent and assess if the scales are still useful in predicting poorer blood sugar control. We also would like to examine what psychosocial factors are associated with DD within this population and would like to examine if financial distress can better predict higher levels of distress than income alone. Therefore, we would hope this research would be useful in better identifying the emotional and psychological needs within this population and that it can begin to delineate how DD relates to blood sugar control. We also believe that our analysis of a patient's money worries and how they think about their diabetes may better inform interventions to reduce DD by evaluating maladaptive thought patterns and how worries in other areas of life impact upon DD.
REC name
South Central - Hampshire B Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
14/SC/1050
Date of REC Opinion
13 Jun 2014
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion