The Effects of Virtual Directed Painting Therapy on Anxiety, Depression, and Self-efficacy of Children with Type 1 Diabetes: A Randomized Controlled Clinical Trial.
Mina Zamanifard, Mitra Soltanian, Mitra Edraki and 2 others
PMID 35855382WHAT IT FOUND
Children with type 1 diabetes who added WhatsApp painting therapy to routine care had lower depression scores than routine care alone.
Anxiety was lower in the painting group than in routine care, but did not change within either group, and self-efficacy did not differ.
Key findings
01After the intervention, total anxiety scores were lower in the painting therapy group than in the routine-care group (P=0.02), but neither group changed significantly from its own baseline (P=0.12 and P=0.15).
02After the intervention, total depression scores were significantly lower in the painting therapy group than in the routine-care group (P<0.001), and depression decreased within the painting group (P<0.001) but not within the control group (P=0.34).
03Total self-efficacy did not differ between groups before or after the intervention (P=0.28 and P=0.20) and did not change within either group (P=0.99 and P=0.69).
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
The trial included only 40 children from one diabetes clinic in Iran, so the results may not apply to other settings or broader populations. Children and parents knew which group they were in, and the outcomes were self-reported, so expectations or reporting bias may have affected scores. The intervention was delivered at home through WhatsApp by a pediatric nursing master's student trained in painting therapy, with an assistant psychologist, so the effect may depend on this specific delivery. Outcomes were measured only at the end of the intervention, so the study does not show whether the anxiety and depression differences lasted. The anxiety result was mainly a between-group difference after intervention; neither group changed significantly from its own baseline, so the anxiety finding is less straightforward than the depression finding.
Declared interests
The study was funded by Shiraz University of Medical Sciences and was extracted from a nursing master's thesis.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that painting therapy reduced anxiety within each child or improved diabetes self-efficacy. Total anxiety did not change significantly within either group, and total self-efficacy did not differ between groups.