A prospective observational study to assess the effectiveness of an electronic health (E-health) and mobile health (M-health) platform versus conventional care for the management of diabetes mellitus

Abstract

We undertook a prospective observational study to evaluate the effectiveness of an electronic health (E-health)/mobile health (M-health) platform versus conventional care for the management of diabetes mellitus. One hundred nine patients with type 2 diabetes were recruited from a tertiary care hospital in India. Thirty-nine patients were enrolled in the Diabetes Care 24x7® (DC) arm, whilst 70 were enrolled in the control (conventional care) group. Primary endpoints included fasting blood sugars (FBS), post-prandial blood sugars (2hr PP) and HbA1c level. Secondary endpoints included knowledge of the disease and its impact on quality of life. Outcome measures were assessed at the initial and fifth month visit. Males/females ≥18 years, attending the diabetes clinic, met the inclusion criteria. Pregnant women were excluded. Eighty six patients completed the study (33 in DC and 53 in the control group). A statistically significant reduction was observed in HbA1c (8.8 ± 1.2 to 7.4 ± 1.3, p value = 0.001). FBS/2hr PP blood sugars showed a trend towards improvement in both arms, but intergroup correlation at study end did not reach statistical significance (p value = 0.5). Diabetes knowledge scores (19.9 ± 2.5 vs. 17.9 ± 3.98, p value = 0.005) and quality of life indices (88.5 ± 7.8 vs. 83.5 ± 10.7, p value = 0.015) showed a statistically significant improvement in the intervention arm. A multifaceted E-health/M-health platform has great potential to reach patients in remote corners of the globe and improve not only their disease parameters but their knowledge scores and quality of life indices. Further longitudinal studies are needed to assess the true potential of this technology to impact diabetes management in the twenty-first century.