State Board Nursing Practice Standards and Government Policies

State Board Nursing Practice Standards and Government Policies

Today, understanding policies to predict and manage diabetes is important for nurses and patients who have to live with this condition. For example, the World Health Organization (2021) provides specific guidelines for several non-communicable diseases and improves public awareness, marking 14 November as World Diabetes Day. The Affordable Care Act reduces care costs in the United States and offers the best care quality through Medicare and Medicaid insurance programs. It is not enough for nurses to inform patients about the basics of diabetes but to check individual involvement in self-management and medication adherence.

Care Quality, Patient Safety, and Costs of Care

Despite the intention to predict diabetes and create the most effective care conditions, this disease is still associated with multiple complications and problems, affecting care quality, costs, and patient safety. One of the main areas of improvement is the knowledge about diabetes ordinary people have to promote care quality. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2020) investigates what American adults know about diabetes and defines that only 15.3% have appropriate prediabetic awareness. It means that most people remain poorly informed about the risks of diabetes and other hypoglycemia complications and cannot adopt lifestyle changes properly. Regarding the history of the disease and the genetic predisposition, some families understand the threats. Still, if a person has never been exposed to this health problem, it is hard to comprehend how diabetes changes human life. Living with diabetes imposes certain limitations and obligations, and improved care quality requires nurses and other stakeholders to be involved in the care process.

When a diabetes diagnosis is proven, it is important not to panic but consider available treatment options. Patient safety is a vital responsibility for nurses and other healthcare providers involved in the care process. Insulin is one of the most common and effective medications for patients. However, Kolb et al. (2020) admit that too many good insulin characteristics might be bad for body patients if systematic insulin levels are not followed. At the initial stages of diabetes treatment, doctors define doses for patients and ask nurses to take administration steps carefully. People are discharged from hospitals and become responsible for diabetes management and medication arrangements with time. Bain et al. (2019) notice that self-administration status is poorly covered in the electronic prescribing and medicines administration (EPMA) system. Thus, being neglected for evaluation, some diabetic agents could be dangerous for patients and question patient safety issues.

Finally, today, individuals have access to various options to manage diabetes, control their vital signs, and indicate blood sugar levels, which are characterized by different costs. Some people know how to implement recent technological options as a part of mobile health (mHealth) interventions. The proliferation of such commercial diabetes applications empowers patients to self-monitor and promote self-efficacy (Istepanian & Al-Anzi, 2018). It is expected of physicians and nurses to educate individuals and distribute new guidelines and protocols in a short period. In addition to prescribing medications and talking about healthy lifestyles, people need to eliminate their knowledge gaps and be technically ready to manage diabetes and complete monitoring, considering available resources and evaluating costs.