Evaluation of an instruction programme on diabetes diet by means of a teaching machine.

In 119 patients with diabetes, student nurses, social workers, dietitians and medical students a pretest was carried out with multiple-choice questions on the subject of diabetes diet. The group was then exposed to programmed diet instruction with a teaching machine. There was a significant learning effect as measured by the score differences with identical and analogue post-tests. Programmed self-teaching with feed back by multiple-choice questions seems to be an efficient method of instruction of basic facts of nutrition for diabetics thus enabling the physician to spend more time on the patient's personal problems.