Endocrine Abstracts

Introduction: Nutritional management and adequate food intake is one of the fundamental cornerstones in the treatment of Type 1Diabetes Mellitus (Type 1 DM) to achieve optimal diabetes control, and reduced risk of micro vascular complications. Despite this emphasis on the importance of dietary education and management, the actual dietary intake of Tunisian adolescents with diabetes is not well documented.

Aim: The aims were to describe the food and nutrient intakes in adolescents with Type 1 diabetes, to assess the importance of the dietary regime in the diabetes self-management and finally, to investigate associations between dietary intake and glycemic control.

Patients and Methods: We conduct a cross-sectional study including 33 adolescents with type 1 diabetes. Dietary intake was assessed with three 24-h recall interviews with each participant. We used The Summary of Diabetes Self Care Activities questionnaire in Arabic version. (SDSCA-AR) as a reliable and valid self-report measure of diabetes self-managementto evaluate the dietary regim self-care activities.

Results: General diet and specific diet were the gaps in specific self-care activities among adolescents with type 1 DM. The total energy intake of the adolescents is more than recommended in (63.6%). Carbohydrate and protein intakes was less than recommended in respectively 57.6% et 80.80% of the participants. However, lipid intake exceed the recommendation in 72.7% of the patients. The intake of fruits vegetables, and milk were insufficient. Nerveless the consumption of cereals are above the recommendation. Pastries and sweets were consumed by (84.4%) of the included patients. The glycemic control (HbA1C) was significantly associated with energy intake (P=0.01), (Body mass Index) BMI (P=0.02) and the age at the moment of the diagnosis of the diabetes. However, there was no relation between HbA1c and the nutrient intake.

Conclusion: Adolescents with type 1 diabetes pray less attention to the diet in the self-management activities. They did not met the dietary requirements. The food consumption can affect metabolic control. The nutrition therapy and promoting the dietary in the self-care activities of this population is very important and need to be regular and updated.