Type 1 diabetes is estimated to affect roughly 300,000 individuals across Canada . Though often conflated with type 2 diabetes in public health surveys and casual discourse, its risk factors, etiology, and patient population are distinct from those of type 2 diabetes. One might therefore expect two things: first, that the model of intervention used in telehealth-assisted management of type 1 diabetes would also be distinct; and second, that the population would not necessarily respond to forms of management that were successful in patients with type 2 diabetes. Due to these considerations, studies looking solely or primarily at the use of home telehealth in managing type 1 diabetes are here addressed separately from those with a focus on type 2 diabetes.
Home telehealth is used to support the management of type 1 diabetes in a number of ways. Its most frequent embodiment is as a remote monitoring service. Patients upload their blood glucose values to a provider-accessible server and receive feedback that assists them in managing their condition. Target populations tend consist of patient with sub-optimal glycemic control, but the emphasis is generally on supporting self-management rather than on enabling remote management. The feedback mentioned above, for instance, may simply be a graphic display of blood glucose trends. The provider can access this display and provide advice, but does not respond to every data transmission with an explicit recommendation.
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- Scope of Literature
- Intervention Design and Implementation
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