A Health Psychologist is offering healthcare professionals materials to help type 2 diabetes patients manage their diet.
The resource packs are designed to help practice nurses working with diabetes patients
Health Psychologists have been studying the best ways of motivating people to change behaviour for decades and we hope that this resource pack will provide useful tools for practice nurses to motivate patients to make changes to their dietary behaviour.
Dr Rachel Povey, Associate Professor of Health Psychology, created the resource packs through research funded by the European Association for the Study of Diabetes and GlaxoSmithKline.
A healthy diet helps to manage blood sugar levels and these handy guides are designed to help practice nurses motivate diabetes patients to improve their eating habits.
Based on focus groups with nurses, dieticians and a survey of people with type 2 diabetes, the packs include useful resources intended to help patients weighing up the pros and cons of eating more healthily, estimate portion sizes, plan changes and keep motivated.
Dr Povey explained: “Health Psychologists have been studying the best ways of motivating people to change behaviour for decades and we hope that this resource pack will provide useful tools for practice nurses to motivate patients to make changes to their dietary behaviour.
“It is important to understand a patient’s perceived barriers towards following dietary advice, and these resources provide an opportunity for practitioners to learn about their patients and provide tailored support.
“Sometimes patients believe they are eating well, but when you dig a little deeper you find that they don’t understand things like portion size or how often they should eat, so something like a food diary can really help.”
Diabetes UK recently reported that diabetes costs have hit record high in England. Now, Dr Povey is giving away copies of her resource pack for free to mark World Diabetes Day on Thursday 14 November.
She said: “Type 2 diabetes usually develops in people over the age of 40 although, with the growing prevalence of obesity, is also seen in younger people and sometimes even children.
“Enabling people to adopt and maintain a healthy lifestyle is considered to be the ‘cornerstone’ of good diabetes care. Diabetes is a major risk factor for heart disease and other long-term health conditions if left untreated so managing your diet is incredibly important.”
To request a copy of the resource pack ‘Motivating Dietary Change among People with Type 2 Diabetes’ please email Dr Povey on r.povey@staffs.ac.uk.