# Leveraging Social Media to Improve Health Outcomes in Adolescents with Diabetes

> **NIH NIH K23** · SEATTLE CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL · 2020 · $188,999

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT
This proposal describes a five-year research training program that will allow me to achieve my long-term goal
of becoming an independent faculty-scientist dedicated to improving healthcare quality and patient health for
youth with diabetes. The majority of adolescents with type 1 diabetes (T1D) in the United States are not
meeting the goals of therapy. I propose to develop tools to provide innovative diabetes management support to
adolescents outside of the clinic setting through the use of social media (SM) and evaluate its feasibility and
acceptability to adolescents with T1D. SM has become an integral part of adolescents’ lives and at this time,
there is an absence of high quality empirical studies investigating the use of SM in the healthcare setting.
Given the need for impactful interventions to support adolescent T1D management, this work has the potential
to result in a major advance for disease management in this vulnerable population.
The goal of this proposal is to develop a patient-centered SM intervention that will enhance patient self-efficacy
and improve health outcomes for adolescents with T1D. I will achieve this goal by first identifying several
different SM intervention strategies for distinct segments of adolescents with diabetes. In Aim 1, I plan to
conduct a survey of a large sample of adolescents with T1D to examine perceptions on how SM can be utilized
in diabetes management and then using latent class analysis techniques, I will segment adolescents based on
patient characteristics and preferences around the use of SM. In Aim 2, I will incorporate additional stakeholder
input, including caregivers and healthcare team members, through the use of user-centered design workshops
to develop a pilot SM intervention based on previous formative work. By engaging adolescents, caregivers,
and healthcare team members in an iterative process of user-centered design workshops I hope to develop a
SM intervention that is consistent with key stakeholder values, preferences and goals. In Aim 3, I will pilot the
SM intervention in a randomized controlled trial and examine its feasibility and acceptability. In addition, I plan
to explore the impact on patient-reported outcomes (e.g. self-efficacy) and glycemic control.
My research will be supported by an outstanding group of mentors with expertise in social media research,
pediatric diabetes, survey research, and the design of clinical interventions. By accomplishing the aims in this
proposal, I will address current gaps in our understanding of how to leverage SM to support adolescents with
chronic disease. In addition, this proposal will allow me to take the next critical steps on my research training
trajectory by providing me the opportunity to acquire additional research skills required to design, evaluate and
implement behavioral health interventions using social media. Ultimately, this proposal will allow me to build a
research program to investigate system-orie...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10001504
- **Project number:** 5K23DK119465-03
- **Recipient organization:** SEATTLE CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL
- **Principal Investigator:** Faisal Saleem Malik
- **Activity code:** K23 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $188,999
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2018-09-07 → 2023-08-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10001504

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10001504, Leveraging Social Media to Improve Health Outcomes in Adolescents with Diabetes (5K23DK119465-03). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-22 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10001504. Licensed CC0.

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