A Pilot Study to Assess the Feasibility of the Spanish Diabetes Self-Management Program in the Basque Country

Table 2

Cardiovascular clinical variables and number of medical visits and times of hospitalization at baseline and 6 months after the intervention.

Variables	n	Preintervention	Mean difference (95% CI)	p value
Cardiovascular data
HbA1c level	166	7.3 (1.1)	0.1 (−0.1, 0.2)	0.348
HbA1c < 7%; n (%)		72 (43)	3 (−4, 9)	0.465
BMI	167	30.4 (5.3)	−0.1 (−0.3, 0.1)	0.461
Total cholesterol	164	197.8 (37.9)	−3.2 (−7.6, 1.2)	0.158
REGICOR score	145	7.2 (3.8)	−0.2 (−0.6, 0.3)	0.466
SBP	166	137.1 (16.6)	−3.3 (−5.3, −1.2)	0.002
DBP	166	79.2 (9.9)	−1.4 (−2.5, −0.2)	0.024
Good blood pressure control SBP < 140 & DBP < 90; n (%)	166	88 (53)	10 (3, 18)	0.007
Medication consumption	171
Antidiabetics; n (%)		133 (78)	1 (−2, 4)	0.479
Antihypertensives; n (%)		98 (57)	0 (−4, 4)	1.000
Antiplatelet drugs; n (%)		56 (33)	1 (−5, 2)	0.527
Number of medications; median (Q1, Q3)		3 (1, 4)	0 (0, 0)	0.763
Number of medical visits; median (Q1,Q3)	165
General practitioner		3 (2, 5)	−1 (−1, 0)	0.005
Primary care nurse		4 (2, 5)	−1 (−1, −1)	<0.0001
Emergency department		0 (0, 0)	0 (0, 0)	0.815
Hospital admissions		0 (0, 0)	0 (0, 0)	0.278

Data are mean (standard deviation), unless otherwise stated. n (%) = frequency (percentage). The “n” column reports frequencies of available data at both time points. REGICOR estimates cardiovascular risk for patients between 35 and 74 years of age. Differences were calculated as postintervention minus preintervention values. CI: confidence interval. Q1, Q3: 25th and 75th percentiles. HbA1c: glycated haemoglobin. BMI: body mass index. SBP: systolic blood pressure; DBP: diastolic blood pressure. Mean difference for categorical variables corresponds to differences in paired proportions and their respective 95% CI and for ordinal variables (i.e., total number of medications and medical visits) to median differences with their respective 95% CI. Reported p values are based on paired t-tests for continuous variables, McNemar’s test for binary variables, and the Wilcoxon signed-rank test for ordinal variables. Medical visits were assessed for the intervals of 6 months before and after intervention. Only diabetes-related complications were considered for the emergency department visits and hospital admissions.