Calling All Diabetes Care Providers: Register for an Innovative Course on Behavioral Diabetes

Twitter Summary: Workshop from UCSD + BDI teaches #diabetes care providers skills for motivational and behavioral approaches to care – register now!

Attention all healthcare providers! We’re highlighting an excellent opportunity for anyone who treats people with diabetes (endocrinologists, educators, primary care providers, and more!) and who wants to further develop skills in behavioral and motivational approaches to diabetes. The program is called Promoting Behavior Change in Diabetes: A Skill Building Program for Healthcare Professionals, and is led by renowned behavioral diabetes experts Dr. Bill Polonsky and Dr. Susan Guzman from UC San Diego and the Behavioral Diabetes Institute. This two-day intensive training course in behavioral diabetes offers small-group, case-based curriculum that will provide participants with a review of the latest research in behavioral diabetes and present a new model for understanding motivational issues in diabetes. The workshop is offered on January 22-23, as well as February 26-27 in San Diego – registration is open now at this link!

We encourage patients to also share this workshop with their care team – it’s an excellent opportunity for care providers to learn how to better support the needs of people with diabetes that impact daily life beyond A1c, including social stigma, diabetes distress, avoiding burnout and mastering motivation, and more. 

According to the registration site, the program will teach participants how to:

• Describe the complex role of motivation in diabetes self-care.

• Perform a comprehensive assessment of the common psychosocial obstacles to effective self-management behaviors.

• Perform a comprehensive assessment of the common psychosocial obstacles to diabetes medication adherence.

• Describe the major strategies for addressing depression and diabetes-related emotional distress.

• Demonstrate collaborative communication skills aimed towards enhancing patients’ belief that adequate self-management is necessary and worthwhile.

• Demonstrate the use of diabetes-focused action planning strategies.

• Describe the key strategies for providing the ongoing support and resources needed to make self-management doable over the long-term.

Behavioral diabetes is a critical area of focus in diabetes care, and we applaud Drs. Polonsky and Guzman for their incredible work in this area. To learn more about the workshop, please see this link, and check out some of our own articles on behavioral diabetes for actionable tips:

• Mastering Motivation with Diabetes

• Diabetes Distress: Why It’s Common and What We Can Do About It

• Why is Diabetes (and Life) So Stressful?

• The Numbers of Shame and Blame: How Stigma Affects Diabetes Management

• Change Your Questions, Change Your Diabetes: Why the Words We Choose Matter A Lot

[Editor’s Note: Kelly L. Close, Editor-in-Chief of diaTribe, was previously a member of the BDI Board of Directors.]

-AJW