Diabetes: Living My Best Life®, An Interactive Self-Paced CD-ROM Program for African-American Women with Type 2 Diabetes

Diabetes: Living My Best Life®, an interactive self-paced CD-ROM program for African-American women with type 2 diabetes, has been developed to help women address their self-management needs. Diabetes: Living My Best Life® is informed by social cognitive theory to address the self-care and educational needs of African-American women with type 2 diabetes. HealthMark staff members Susan Brink, DrPH, will be discussing the social cognitive theory application to this new technology at a poster session at the International Conference on Communication in Healthcare, which will take place in Basel, Switzerland, September 5-8, 2006.

Washington, DC (PRWEB) September 7, 2006 -- Diabetes: Living My Best Life® is informed by social cognitive theory to address the self-care and educational needs of African-American women with type 2 diabetes.

HealthMark staff member Susan Brink, DrPH, will be discussing the social cognitive theory application to this new technology at a poster session at the International Conference on Communication in Healthcare, which will take place in Basel, Switzerland, September 5-8, 2006.

About Diabetes: Living My Best Life®:

Diabetes: Living My Best Life® presents the stories of four women with type 2 diabetes to provide a framework for understanding the challenges to real-life self-management of blood sugar, food and nutrition, exercise, and medical care. Accompanying each story are in-depth content and interactive tools for skill practice in reading food labels, controlling portions, monitoring blood sugar, overcoming barriers, and other essential tasks related to self-management. The importance of social support and cultural context for African-American women suggests that the social cognitive approach taken with this product may be effective in assisting women in self-managing their disease. The product attracts and maintains the user's attention through a colorful interface and videos of African-American women as role models reflecting, coping, taking action, and succeeding in managing their type 2 diabetes. Computer simulations and learning activities enhance retention and encourage application through skill rehearsal and self-testing. Role-model testimonials motivate and encourage goal setting and development of self-management skills.

About the International Conference on Communication in Healthcare:

This 2006 conference will bring together international delegates and speakers to review the latest thinking and practice in all aspects of communication in health care. This year’s conference is being sponsored by The European Association for Communication in Healthcare (EACH), an interdisciplinary non-profit organization that brings together researchers and teachers in the field of communication in health care. The objectives of the conference are to facilitate the exchange of ideas and teaching and research activities within a network of individuals and institutions. The 2005 conference was sponsored by The Program in Communication and Medicine, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. HealthMark Multimedia also presented at that meeting.

About HealthMark Multimedia: HealthMark Multimedia provides creative technology approaches to meeting the information, self-care and decision needs of patients facing critical health care issues.

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