Instructional Modeling of Content on Diabetic Foot Prevention in Patients with Risk Factors

Abstract

Introduction: The educational model presented here, which addresses the teaching and learning of diabetic foot prevention in patients with risk factors, was the theoretical outcome of doctoral research specifically, one of the scientific tasks the author undertook for the purposes of this article in collaboration with the other two authors, who served as his advisors.

Objective: To develop a didactic model for the teaching and learning of diabetic foot prevention in patients with risk factors, within the General Surgery course, for medical students in primary health care.

Methods: The research was classified according to its purpose as fundamentally theoretical in orientation; according to its epistemological objective, as explanatory; and according to the scope of its results, as nomothetic. Based on dialectical materialism as a universal scientific method, the general methods of the theoretical level analysis-synthesis and systemic modeling were employed, along with the clinical-epidemiological-social method as a specific approach.

Results: A didactic model was developed for the teaching and learning of content on the prevention of diabetic foot in patients with risk factors, within the General Surgery course, for medical students in primary health care. This model was structured around premises, an essential contradiction, subsystems, and components.

Conclusions: The didactic model for teaching and learning about diabetic foot prevention in patients with risk factors, within the General Surgery course, for medical students in primary health care, was developed based on the historical, theoretical, and empirical foundations explored in this study. Its structure included two premises, one essential contradiction, two subsystems with three components each, and one resulting quality.