Seeking new identity through the empowerment process

BACKGROUND: All health professionals are responsible for facilitating empowerment among people with diabetes. However, research suggests that health professionals do not have the knowledge and skills to help people with diabetes become empowered. As a result, many Iranian people with diabetes do not become empowered. The aim of the study was to explore and understand how empowerment occurs in Iranian people with diabetes. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Grounded theory using individual open in-depth interviews, field notes, and memos was used to collect data from 25 people with diabetes, their families, and health professionals. Strauss and Corbin's constant comparative analysis was used to analyze the data. FINDINGS: Empowerment is a transitional, perceptual, and continuous process. The process for people with diabetes includes threatened identity when diabetes is diagnosed, reconstructing identity, and integrating diabetes into identity to become an empowered person with diabetes. The empowerment process was influenced by a combination of knowledge, social support, values and beliefs, psychosocial issues, and the nature of diabetes. CONCLUSIONS: Health professionals can help people with diabetes integrate diabetes into their identity and become empowered; however, becoming empowered is complicated and occurs over time.