Motivational interviewing to improve self-management in youth with type 1 diabetes: A randomized clinical trial

Effective interventions are needed to help adolescents with T1D develop independent self-management skills to prevent commonly observed deterioration of disease self-management resulting in poor health outcomes. Using a prospective RCT design, we assessed the impact of a nurse-led education program based on motivational interviewing (MI) in youth with Type 1 diabetes (T1D).After parental consent and youth assent, we prospectively randomized 66 adolescents 13-18 years old with T1D to either usual care (every 3 months visit with pediatric endocrinologist) or usual care supplemented by 2 in-person and 4 follow-up phone calls with a nurse educator in a pediatric endocrinology clinic of the University Hospital Farhat Hached, Sousse, Tunisia. We used MI sessions to support youth general and disease specific self-management skills. Outcomes were change, between baseline and 6 months, in TRAQ (a validated measure of youth self-management) scores and HbA1c values.Mean TRAQ scores (based on a 5-point Likert scale) increased by 1.44 points (s.d. = 0.56) in the Intervention Group versus 0.26 points (s.d. = 0.34) in the control group (p0.001). The mean HbA1C value decreased in the intervention group by 0.95 units versus a decrease of 0.12 units in the control group (p = 0.047).We found that a brief, nurse-led MI-based educational intervention, integrated into specialty pediatric care, resulted in a significant improvement in both self-reported self-management skills and in HbA1c values.Registered in ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT04798937.