from four outpatient clinics in St Michael’s Hospital, Dublin. Two of these clinics were for people with T2D and two were clinics for people with T1D.
Each insulin-treated person involved in the study was examined for lipohypertrophy using observation and palpation techniques. Lipohypertrophy was assessed as “present” or “not present”. The presence of a noticeable or palpable lump at the injection site indicated that lipohypertrophy was present.
Questionnaire
A questionnaire was developed using a relevant literature search and incorporating the recent Irish guidelines for insulin injection technique (Forum for Injection Technique [FIT] Ireland, 2012). It comprised six multiple-choice questions that aimed to assess the duration and frequency of insulin injection, needle length and site rotation. There were four or five answers to chose from for each question. They were asked to fill out the form in the waiting area and to return to a box located at the reception area of the outpatients’ clinic. The questionnaire can be seen in Box 1. Questionnaire data was complete for all questions, except needle change (n=52) and site rotation (n=53).
Descriptive statistics are presented as mean and standard deviation (SD) or as a number and percentage. Differences between scale variables were determined using t-tests for unpaired data, and between categorical variables using chi-squared tests.
The association between lipohypertrophy and all potential predictors was tested using multiple logistic regression analysis; results are presented as odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI). Results were considered significant if P