The attitudes, experiences, and self-competencies of pediatric endocrinology fellows and attending physicians regarding diabetes technology: the Turkey experience
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Gul Yesiltepe Mutlu
,
Elif Eviz
Abstract
Background
Unlike in Western countries, the use of diabetes technologies has been limited in Turkey, or at least until the last few years. This low adoption frequency may be attributed to the lack of experience of pediatric diabetes teams in working with new technologies. The aim of this study is to evaluate the attitudes, experiences and self-efficacies of pediatric endocrinology fellows and attending physicians in terms of use of continuous subcutaneous insulin infusion (CSII) therapy and continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) systems.
Methods
The questionnaire used in this study consisted of 63 questions including 10 questions evaluating the demographic characteristics and experience of the participants, 33 Likert-type questions related to self-competency, 17 yes/no questions and 3 open-ended questions which evaluated attitudes towards our study area. This questionnaire was e-mailed to pediatric endocrinology fellows and attending physicians working in Turkey.
Results
A total of 24 fellows and 28 attending physicians working in the field of pediatric endocrinology participated in the survey. Of the respondents, 61% reported that there was no formal training curriculum regarding diabetes technology at their institutions. The mean scores obtained from the Likert scale questions measuring self-competency in using CSII and CGM were 3.8 and 3.3 out of 5, respectively. Of the respondents, 55% judged themselves to be under-skilled in interpreting pump reports while 39% of the respondents reported themselves as being under-skilled in interpreting CGM reports.
Conclusions
While it is true that training programs for using diabetes technology have been established by the National Pediatric Endocrinology Association in Turkey, the development of a specific curriculum for institutions that provide pediatric endocrinology fellowship training in this framework will increase the self-confidence of pediatric endocrinologists in this matter and this will ultimately contribute to the improvement of the metabolic control of children with diabetes.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank all the physicians who participated in our study and Alan J. Newson for English language editing. (Alan J. Newson is an Academic Proofreader in İstanbul University).
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Research funding: None declared.
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Author contribution: GYM, EE, SS, and SH contributed to the study concept and design. GYM and ŞH supervised the study. GYM, EE, and TG collected data. All authors participated in data analysis and interpretation. The manuscript was drafted by GYM, reviewed by GYM, EE, EE, TG, SS, SH and edited by SS and SH. All contributing authors approved the final version of the manuscript. *Dr. Gul Yesiltepe Mutlu is the guarantor of this work and, as such, had full access to all the data in the study and takes responsibility for the integrity of the data and the accuracy of the data analysis.
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Competing interests: Authors state no conflict of interest.
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Informed consent: Informed consent was obtained from all individuals included in this study.
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Ethical approval: The local Institutional Review Board deemed the study exempt from review.
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Supplementary Material
The online version of this article offers supplementary material (https://doi.org/10.1515/jpem-2022-0024).
© 2022 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
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- Frontmatter
- Review Article
- Impact of Obesity on Bone Metabolism in Children
- Mini Review
- Late sequelae of drug reaction with eosinophilia and systemic symptoms (DRESS) cause thyroid dysfunction and thyroiditis: review of literature
- Original Articles
- Moderating effect of bone maturation on the relationship between body fat and insulin resistance
- Prevalence of nephropathy in Indian children and youth with type 1 diabetes mellitus
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- An update of the mutation spectrum of phenylalanine hydroxylase (PAH) gene in the population of Turkey
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- Homozygous missense variant of PTH (c.166C>T, p.(Arg56Cys)) as the cause of familial isolated hypoparathyroidism in a three-year-old child
- Long-term follow-up of transient neonatal diabetes mellitus due to a novel homozygous c.7734C>T (p.R228C) mutation in ZFP57 gene: relapse at prepubertal age
