"Give me some sugar!" the diabetes self-management activities of African-American primary caregiving grandmothers.

PURPOSE

To compare the diabetes self-management activities of African American primary caregiving grandmothers before and after the initiation of caregiving and to compare the diabetes self-management activities of African American primary caregiving grandmothers to diabetic women who were not caring for their grandchildren.

DESIGN

Using a cross-sectional, descriptive design, 68 African American women 55 to 75 years of age were recruited as part of a larger study examining the impact of caregiving responsibilities on the diabetic health of African American primary caregiving grandmothers. Each participant was asked the frequency of their performance of six self-management activities. Caregiving grandmothers were asked about these activities before and after the initiation of caregiving.

RESULTS

Dependent and independent t-tests with Bonferroni correction were used to analyze the data. Statistically significant differences were noted in diet (t=4.400, p=.000) and self-monitoring of blood glucose (SMBG; t=3.484, p=.001) before and after the initiation of caregiving. For the caregiver versus non-caregiver comparison, statistically significant differences were noted in SMBG (t=-3.855, p=.000) and eye examinations (t=-3.211, p=.001).

CONCLUSIONS

The findings provide preliminary data to support further research examining the self-management activities of diabetic African American primary caregiving grandmothers. Diabetic African American primary caregiving grandmothers may have a decreased ability to integrate self-management activities into their daily patterns of living. Additional research is needed to determine what factors prevent this population from performing these tasks routinely.

CLINICAL RELEVANCE

African American primary caregiving grandmothers were found to have more difficulty performing some of their self-management activities, which may severely impact their overall diabetic health.