Self-care capacity, functional capacity and health literacy of elderly people with type 2 diabetes mellitus

• Grant number: 24/23326-3
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: August 01, 2025
• End date: July 31, 2026
• Field of knowledge: Health Sciences - Nursing
• Principal Investigator: Maria Helena de Melo Lima
• Grantee: Amanda de Oliveira de Sandes
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Enfermagem. Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Campinas , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The International Diabetes Federation estimates that there will be 643 million people with diabetes mellitus (DM) by 2030 worldwide, creating a significant social and financial burden on countries, especially low- and middle-income countries, where 80% of people with DM live. In addition to DM, there is a growing prevalence of cognitive disorders, such as dementia, which generate progressive decline in cognitive and physical functions, and represent the main cause of care needs in older people worldwide. DM significantly increases the risk of cognitive disorders, which in turn increases the risk for other chronic conditions, adverse health events, and higher mortality in this population. However, there are still gaps in understanding how these combined conditions affect the self-care capacity of older people with DM2, highlighting the need for more research and interventions aimed at this vulnerable population. Thus, the objective of this study is to investigate the relationship between self-care capacity, functional capacity levels and health literacy in elderly people with T2DM. Methods: cross-sectional study. Eligible will be elderly people (60 years and older) with a diagnosis of type 2 diabetes mellitus, using oral pharmacological treatment or insulin therapy, in follow-up by the public primary health care service. Those who cannot understand or answer the questions of the study independently, either due to a severe cognitive deficit, or sensory or motor problems (SDD), will be considered ineligible. Those who cannot consent to participate independently but can still understand and answer questions about their health and self-care may participate with the help and consent of a responsible family member. Instruments for sociodemographic characterization, assessment of cognitive function, functional capacity, self-care capacity in diabetes and assessment of health literacy will be used. The data will be described by means of frequencies and percentages for qualitative variables and by means of position and dispersion measures for quantitative variables. The associations between the scale of the instruments and the sociodemographic and clinical variables will be evaluated by means of the chi-square or exact Fisher tests. Regression analyses will be conducted to evaluate the relationship between self-care and functional and sociodemographic, clinical and health literacy variables. The presence of uni or multivariate outliers will be investigated and, if found, they will be excluded from the sample. It will be adopted as significance level p 0.05. The results will show the estimates obtained of prevalence ratio and their respective confidence intervals and p-values.