Abir Dipu
HE 201
04/13/2015
In America, diabetes is becoming a more concerning issues with these high calorie beverages and junk food. It has reached a point where children in school are at risk of having diabetes, or they already have diabetes. The diabetes that was discussed in this article “Evaluation of the Impact of a Diabetes Education Curriculum for School Personnel on Disease Knowledge and Confidence in Caring for Students” is type 1 diabetes. Type 1 diabetes is a critical condition in which the pancreas can no longer produce insulin necessary to control blood glucose levels. There is approximately 215,000 people under twenty who are diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, this means that 1.54 out of every 1,000 children is at risk of having diabetes. This can lead to heart disease, neuropathy, nephropathy, and retinopathy. School personnel may lack the knowledge to discuss type 1 diabetes in school, so participating schools allowed two types of diabetes education to be taught and see which one is more effective for students to learn from. The New Albany-Floyd County Consolidated School Corporation in Indiana provided two types of diabetes lessons to be taught in various elementary, middle, and high schools. One program is a basic 60 minute overview on diabetes, and the other is a expanded program, intended, providing participants with a more in-depth overview of diabetes during a 180-minute session. In the 6 minute session, there were four main components that were taught, overview of diabetes pathology, monitoring and treating diabetes, dietary considerations for diabetics, and topics of exercising and glucose. The extended session discussed, counting school lunch carbohydrates, administering insulin, treating hyperglycemia and hypoglycemia, using a blood glucose meter, and using written diabetes care plans. Once the basic and, extended sessions ended, standard deviation was used to calculate the pre knowledge and pro knowledge dealing with these sessions. A total of 81 schools participated in these two programs and it was found that