Type 2 Diabetes: Preventing Complications

The Surveys

To try to answer these questions, we created a 16-question survey that was aimed at certified diabetes educators (CDEs), the health care professionals who train individuals in proper diabetes management. The questions were designed to find out if CDEs recommend home blood pressure monitoring and if they were aware of accessible HBPMs for people who are visually impaired. We also asked the readers of our AccessWorld Extra publication to answer these three questions:

Has a physician or other health care professional ever recommended to you that you take your blood pressure at home?

Has a physician or other health care professional ever recommended a specific HBPM?

Have you ever tried to purchase or use an accessible HBPM with voice output?

Once the CDE survey was created and a pilot study was completed, a population of qualified CDEs was established. To ensure that the sample was representative of qualified CDEs, we established contacts from a list of members of the American Association of Diabetes Educators. The sample was modified in an attempt to include specialists in diabetes education of people who are visually impaired. After contacting several clinics and visual impairment rehabilitation and information services, we discovered that there are few CDEs who specialize in caring for people who are visually impaired. To strengthen our sample, we found more qualified individuals with a greater knowledge base through recommendations from rehabilitation services and other diabetes educators.

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