Some clinical, psycho-emotional and cognitive aspects in insulin-dependent diabetic young patients at the end of educative camps

The 'campus' represents a good instrument to improve the independence of the child and adolescent with diabetes. What are the expectation of children taking part in it? For them, will it be a vacation or a period of hospitalization? To evaluate these aspects we have studied, in addition to the theoretical and practical knowledge, the emotional life of 53 young diabetics (31 males and 22 females, age 8.1-15.7 years, duration of disease 2 months 10 years, and HbA1c 6.5-12.6%). We observed that 80% of the patients improved the injection technique; we also found an increase of correct answers (from 60% to 73%, x = 3.8, p < 0.05) to a list of questions on different aspects of diabetes asked at the beginning and at the end of the campus. From the drawings collected at the end of the stay, we observed that 78% of the children lived the experience in a playful way, 11% in a medical and 11% in a educational way. It must be pointed out that the children who perceived the educational aspect of the stay were older than the others (11.5 ± 2 vs. 13.9 ± 1; p < 0.05). Consequently, we believe that educational programs on diabetes, like the 'campus', should be reserved to children older than 12 years of age