Shared Responsibility for Type 1 Diabetes Care Is Associated With Glycemic Variability and Risk of Glycemic Excursions in Youth.

Objective: We examined how parent and youth responsibility for type 1 diabetes (T1D) care is related to adherence and glycemic outcomes, namely, glycemic variability and risk of glycemic excursions.

Methods: One hundred thirty-five parent-youth dyads (10-16 years old; diagnosed with T1D for at least 6 months) participated in this study. Percent responsibility of T1D care attributed to the youth, parent, or shared was measured using the Diabetes Family Responsibility Questionnaire. We collected youth's hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) and glucometer downloads to examine relationships between responsibility and HbA1c, frequency of blood glucose monitoring (self-monitoring blood glucose, SMBG), risk of glycemic excursions, and actual glycemic variability using bivariate correlations and path analysis.

Results: Participants reported shared responsibility for almost half of T1D self-care tasks. Bivariate correlations showed shared responsibility was associated with less variability, whereas parent responsibility was associated with greater glycemic variability and risk for glycemic excursions. Youth responsibility was associated with lower frequency of SMBG. The path analyses confirmed our correlational findings (ps<.05) and better characterized interactions with age for youth-reported responsibility.

Conclusions: Our results support the hypothesis that shared T1D responsibility is associated with better diabetes outcomes in youth.