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The benefits of animal-companion ties to well-being are consistently documented, yet few studies use patient-centered methodologies to examine how youth living with chronic illnesses rely on domestic pets for support. Youth with type 1 diabetes (T1D) aged 12 to 19 years (N=40) completed surveys involving a prompt to take five photos of “what diabetes means to you,” with an accompanying narrative. Content analysis was conducted for photos/narratives and numeric variables analyzed including socio-economic status (SES: measured by total household income and years of parental education) and HbA1C. More than half of the youth participants took pictures of coping mechanisms, including pictures of their pets. In fact, pictures of pets outnumbered pictures of people three to one. Pet depictions were captured by youth from all SES levels. Youth with T1D identify pets as an important source of support. More research is needed to understand how pets may offset disease burden for youth with T1D.

Youth with insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus face complex treatment regimens and oftenhave difficulty adhering to treatment requirements. Many behavioral-health interventionstrategies, such as psychoeducational groups, diabetes summer camps, individual therapy,and residential treatment have been utilized to address this issue. While some have been effective,many barriers exist that limit the number of youth who are able to utilize these treatments.Additionally, the effectiveness of these treatments does not typically generalize to thehome environment. Telephone-based, intensive, behavioral-health interventions may addressbarriers to treatment access by providing lower cost treatment that is easier to access for youthwho do not live near a knowledgeable behavioral-health specialist. Additionally, delivery viatelephone enables the interventions to take place in the home. This, in combination withparental involvement in the treatment, may increase generalization of the positive treatmentoutcomes to the home environment. The purpose of this paper is to describe a controlled trialof a telehealth intervention for youth whose diabetes is poorly managed. Preliminary outcomedata for the trial are promising. Representative cases from the trial are presented in casestudyformat. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]