Quality of life of children and young people with diabetes mellitus type I

• Autor(a) principal: Galvão, Dulce Maria Pereira Garcia
• Data de Publicação: 2014
• Outros Autores: Miguéns, Ana Filipa, Barreto, Andreia Patrícia, Lemos, Inês
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://repositorio.esenfc.pt/?url=P01vfxUh
• topic: Quality of life; Child; Young people; Diabetes; Chronic illness.

Introduction: Diabetes Mellitus type I (DMTI) has become apparent in children/young people, a current and worrisome problem due to increasing incidence and prevalence. In addition to its consequences, it interferes with the quality of life (QOF), representing a public health issue. Objectives: Characterize the QOL of children/young people with DMTI; identify factors influencing children/young people with DMTI QOL; check DMTI impact in the QOF of children/young people. Methods: Systematic review of full text studies, published from January 2006 to June 2014 that included the QOF of children/young people with DMTI, children/young people with DMTI with no other pathology and their parents, consulting CINAHL, MEDLINE, MedicLatina, Academic Search Complete, Psychology and Behavioral Sciences Collection and Scholar Google, using "quality of life", "child*", "diabetes". Studies of children/young people with DMTI and other chronic illness were excluded. 546 articles have been identified, 11 selected and seven used. Results: Parents perceive less QOL and greater impact in the life of children/young people than them. Children/young people QOL improve with the insulin pump and severe hypoglycemic crisis and ketoacidosis decrease. Gender and age group influence children/young people QOL. Severe hypoglycemic crisis are related to the parents' fear of hypoglycemia, affecting their and their children's QOL. Young people using complementary and alternative Medicine have better QOL than those using stress relief activities. Children with DMTI have impaired school performance. Conclusion: Children with DMTI have less QOL than before the illness. Nurses shall intervene at a social, physical and emotional level with children/young people and their families to help promoting their QOL.