Greenville, N.C. — Cameroonian born, East Carolina University Scholar Precious Esong Sone, PMP®, MBA, is assembling a practical, people-first model for diabetes care that runs from the emotional weight of living with the disease to the daily realities of preventing foot complications at home. His research portfolio encompasses a seven-week, phone-delivered diabetes self-management program in a U.S. primary-care clinic and a caregiver/clinician Research conducted in Cameroon offers a low-cost blueprint clinics can adopt now.
Sone graduated on May 9, 2025, with an MBA specializing in Healthcare Management from East Carolina University, the degree that anchors his operations-minded approach to patient outcomes. He recently served as an Experience Coordinator in the Emergency Department at ECU Health Medical Center, where he worked at the point of patient contact to improve service and throughput.
Clinic-Ready & Low-Cost: 7 Weeks of 30-Minute Telephonic Sessions Lower Diabetes Distress
Sone’s U.S. pilot tested a digital framework that pairs routine DDS-17 screening (a validated diabetes-distress scale) with weekly, 30-minute telephonic DSME sessions per patient over seven weeks in a rural Imperial County primary-care clinic in collaboration with Dr. Joyce Ekole, DNP, RN. Every adult who completed the seven-week telephone-delivered DSME program reduced their DDS-17 distress scores. For example, one participant went 3.8 → 2.5 and another 2.9 → 1.9 by week seven.
Attendance was 100% in Weeks 1–2, dipped to 75% in Weeks 3–5 and 50% in Week 6, then returned to full participation in Week 7, a common behavioral pattern that supports feasibility and highlights the need for mid-program retention tactics. Direct costs for materials and participant incentives totaled $227. The clinic lift was modest: one physician, medical assistants, one office manager and a data analyst oriented to screening, documentation, and weekly touchpoints which is exactly the staffing many other practices already have.
Home Is the First Clinic: Trained Families Prevent Diabetes Footcare Complications — Backed by 2019–2020 Data
In Cameroon, Sone’s comparative work quantified a critical gap between healthcare professionals and the people who do most of the day-to-day care. In one study, 96.1% of nurses showed adequate diabetic-foot knowledge versus 49.9% of primary caregivers; on perception of their role, 96.1% of nurses reported positive perceptions vs 38.7% of caregivers, evidence the authors use to call for integrated caregiver education.
A second investigation focused solely on caregivers found a strong positive correlation between knowledge and perception (r = 0.62, p < 0.01), and a moderate negative correlation between perceived challenges and perception (r = −0.45, p < 0.05). Top barriers were financial burden (70%), lack of training (65%), and time constraints (55%), reinforcing the need for caregiver-focused education and support.
Why it matters—here and now
Most diabetes care happens in primary care, not specialty clinics. Sone’s model meets that reality: screen the feelings, not just the sugars; teach by phone; train the family. The U.S. pilot validates feasibility and measurable distress relief on a shoestring budget; the Cameroon studies show how caregiver training closes the last-mile gap that drives preventable ulcers and amputations. For North Carolina practices and for systems facing workforce and access constraints globally that’s a clinic-ready path from evidence to impact.
About the researcher:
Precious Esong Sone, PMP®, MBA is a first-author and peer reviewer in digital health, public health and diabetes management; recognized with multiple awards including university, community, national and international awards for innovation and service. Beyond the data, Sone’s academic and professional expertise shows the traction of his ideas. He is a certified Project Management Professional (PMP®) with hands-on hospital and program leadership, including Administrative Clinical Assistant and Program Coordinator at a Regional Hospital in Limbe, Cameroon, Graduate Assistant assigned as Manager of ECU-COB Isley Innovation Hub and Vice President of the Graduate Professional Student Senate at East Carolina University, roles that translate academia, research, and leadership into operations.
During ECU’s 2025 Research and Creative Achievement Week (RCAW), Sone received the Stakeholder’s Choice Award, a campus-wide nod that arrived just weeks after East Carolina University earned the nation’s top-tier Research 1 (R1) designation. R1 statuses are reserved for universities with the highest levels of research activity, demonstrating expanded funding, collaboration, and impact, the very conditions that help translate Sone’s evidence-based diabetes work from study to scale. He also earned the Fred Klutey Spirit Award at ECU Health Medical Center in 2025 and is a member of Omicron Delta Kappa (ODK), the national leadership honor society recognized by ECU’s chapter with its Creative & Innovative Member Award in 2025.
In print, Sone has served as first author on several peer-reviewed work including A Digital Framework for Screening and Managing Diabetes Distress (2025) and the diabetic-foot comparison that anchors the Cameroon evidence base (2020). He has also reviewed manuscripts for recognized journals which are formal signals of subject-matter standing.
