1049-OR: Deafdiabetescan.org: A Diabetes Digital Health Education Website in American Sign Language

Introduction and Objective: There is a dearth of diabetes digital health education resources that address the linguistic and cultural needs of Deaf/hard of hearing (DHH) people living with diabetes (PWD). The project objective was to develop and evaluate the feasibility, usability, acceptability, and appropriateness of a diabetes health education website in American Sign Language (ASL). Methods: A DHH PWD community advisory board (CAB; N=10) participated in five focus groups using a user-centered design approach to development a DHH-accessible diabetes education website. Following CAB approval, additional DHH PWD (N=10) were recruited to review the website and complete interviews assessing website feasibility, usability, acceptability, and appropriateness. Results: The website adheres to WebAIM accessibility guidelines. The homepage features 9 topic-based tiles showing an ASL picture representing that topic (e.g., food, checking glucose). When users hover over a tile, the picture animates into a short looping ASL video to explain the topic. The website includes a dictionary of 42 diabetes-related signs, 20 diabetes education videos following ADA guidelines and 18 peer-generated tip videos focused on how to live well with diabetes - all in ASL with closed captions and English voice over. Interview participants reported that the website was intuitive, easy to use, accessible, understandable, and stated they would recommend it to other DHH PWD. Conclusion: DeafDiabetesCan.org is the first diabetes digital health education resource in ASL and was found to meet the cultural and linguistic needs of DHH PWD. This freely available website provides ASL digital health education resources, giving clinicians and educators a valuable tool to support diabetes literacy and equitable care. Disclosure M. Litchman: Research Support; Current; National Institutes of Health, American Diabetes Association, Dexcom, Inc. K. Mirus: None. L. Farovitch: None. H. Aldridge: None. C.E. Elmore: None. S. Lee: Research Support; Current; Clairvoyant Networks, Olera. E. Iacob: None. N.A. Allen: Research Support; Current; Dexcom, Inc. K.A. Sward: None. Funding National Library of Medicine (G08LM014312)