Background: Health education has proven to be an effective strategy to enable\npeople with diabetes mellitus to manage this condition. However, few studies\nin Brazilian population samples have been conducted to evaluate the effects\nof educational programs on diabetes knowledge and self-care. Aim: To\nevaluate the knowledge about diabetes mellitus and the performance of\nself-care activities, before and after participation in an educational program.\nMethods: This is an intervention study, with a quantitative approach, in a\nsingle comparison group, for the analysis of â??before and afterâ? results related\nto an educational program focused on self-care and concurrent physical\ntraining. The study interventions consisted of 42 exercise sessions, as well as\nindividual educational meetings, according to the needs of each participant\nand through nursing consultations, using educational material prepared from\nthe literature. The sample was initially composed of 33 adults with diabetes\nmellitus, but 18 completed the study. For the assessment of knowledge and\nself-care activities, the revised Brazilian versions of the Diabetes Knowledge\nScale and the Diabetes Self-Care Activity Questionnaire were used, respectively,\nin the two moments of the study, that is, prior to the first educational\nmeeting and immediately before the first physical training session, and after\nthe last educational meeting, which ran parallel to the 42nd physical training\nsession, making a six-month interval between the two assessment moments \nfor each participant. Results: The analysis of knowledge about diabetes\nshowed significant improvement after the educational program and, as for\nself-care, there was clinical improvement in all dimensions, but only the dimension\nâ??general dietâ? obtained statistically significant improvement. Conclusion:\nThe educational program has been shown to be beneficial for improving\nknowledge and self-care of the disease, which reiterates the need to\nmaintain interventions of this nature for people with diabetes mellitus
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