Table 3.

Summary of major themes

Major themes	Brief description of the themes
Susceptibility to severe complications motivates action engagement	Participants were aware of own susceptibility to severe complications that could be caused by poor blood glucose. The awareness could motivate action engagement.
Self-management is beneficial	Self-management, which included lifestyle management, medication therapy, and blood glucose monitoring, was believed by participants to be beneficial for improving blood glucose control. The perceived benefit facilitated self-management engagement.
Barriers to self-management engagement	Practical barriers to self-management engagement were identified. The barriers included: (1) Uselessness of general knowledge about lifestyle management; (2) Difficulty in changing unhealthy habits; (3) Temporary remission and discontinuity of medication therapy engagement; (4) Blood glucose monitoring and physical symptoms.
Two sides of social environment	The influence of social environment on self-management engagement could be both positive and negative
Obtaining reliable information	Providing participants with reliable information about diabetes could improve self-management engagement, while reliable information was not always available