Abstract
Background: Diabetes mellitus (DM) is a public health disease needing urgent consideration; it has a great impact on human life in addition to being costly to manage. According to the current recommendations, self-monitoring of blood glucose (SMBG) is important in order to achieve and maintain glycemic control, prevent and identify hypoglycemia, prevent severe hyperglycemia and support lifestyle changes.
Methods: The objective of this study is to explore the effect of using SMBG on glycemic control among type 2 diabetic patients attending the primary health care centers in Abha city in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, by comparing those who are monitoring themselves and others who are not. The study design was analytical cross-sectional and conducted through an interviewing questionnaire.
Results: The age of participants was 30-82 years old, with a mean age distribution of 57.4 years old. The percentages of groups doing and not doing SMBG were 43% and 57% respectively. Chi square tests show that the relationship between glycemic control and SMBG is statistically significant according to frequency and time of doing SMBG, since almost all of the results for the participants who do SMBG are above the target for glycemic control (>=7%). The relationship between glycemic control and compliance according to SMBG shows there is a statistically significant relationship with appointment compliance among the group doing SMBG, and with drug compliance among the other group.
In both groups, almost all the participants were above the target for control (>=7%), which means that there is no relationship between doing SMBG and better glycemic control.
Conclusion: There is not sufficient evidence to show that the self-monitoring of blood glucose is associated with an improvement in glycemic control among type 2 diabetics and it is shown that glycemic control for both groups that are using and not using SMBG is above the target. It is recommended that more well conducted randomized controlled trials should be undertaken to evaluate the relationship between SMBG and glycemic control in type 2 diabetes, at the same time the current guidelines for the use of SMBG among patients with well controlled non-insulin treated type 2 diabetes need to be reviewed.