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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Public Health
Sec. Public Health Education and Promotion
Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2025.1507726

Effect of social media-based education on self-care status, health literacy, and glycated hemoglobin in patients with type 2 diabetes

Provisionally accepted
Ali Safdari Ali Safdari 1Nazi Nejat Nazi Nejat 2Abdollah Abolfathi Abdollah Abolfathi 3Fatemeh Mehrabi Fatemeh Mehrabi 2*Fatemeh Rafiei Fatemeh Rafiei 4,5
  • 1 Department of Nursing Education, Khomein University of Medical Sciences, khomein, Iran
  • 2 Department of Nursing, Arak University of Medical Sciences, Arak, Iran
  • 3 iranian socila security organization, arak, Iran
  • 4 epartment of Biostatistics, Faculty of Medical Sciences, Arak University of Medical Sciences, Arak, I, Arak, Markazi, Iran
  • 5 Department of Biostatistics, Faculty of Medical Sciences, Arak University of Medical Sciences, Arak, Iran., Arak, Iran

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Objectives: this study examines the impact of social media-based education on health literacy status, self-care, and Glycosylated hemoglobin (HbA1c) in individuals with type 2 diabetes (T2D).Method: This educational intervention study was carried out from March 2022 to June 2022 on diabetic patients visiting the diabetes clinic in Arak, Iran. The patients split into two groups: the virtual education group (n=38) using the Telegram messaging platform and the control group (n=38). Patients in the virtual education group received multimedia messages about T2D daily for four weeks. Data analysis utilized SPSS version 23 and statistical tests.The results of this study showed that the overall score of health literacy and the dimensions of reading, understanding, and evaluation were significantly higher in the intervention group than in the control group (p<0.05). However, the score for the access dimension did not show a significant difference between the two groups (p>0.05). The Wilcoxon test results indicated that the average HbA1c score significantly decreased in the intervention group before and after the intervention. However, these changes were not significant in the control group. Nevertheless, the Mann-Whitney test did not indicate a significant statistical difference between the groups regarding the average HbA1c score before and after the intervention (p>0.05).The findings of this study suggest that social networks provide a suitable platform for delivering self-care education to individuals with T2D. Furthermore, in the long term, it might positively impact the patients' HbA1c levels. Future studies with larger sample sizes can be beneficial in this area.

    Keywords: HbA1c, self-care, Health Literacy, type 2 diabetes, social networks, Iran

    Received: 08 Oct 2024; Accepted: 06 Jan 2025.

    Copyright: © 2025 Safdari, Nejat, Abolfathi, Mehrabi and Rafiei. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Fatemeh Mehrabi, Department of Nursing, Arak University of Medical Sciences, Arak, Iran

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.