Co-designing a diabetes foot screening pathway in South Africa

Jemma Houghton is a fourth year DPhil student at the Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences and Green Templeton College, University of Oxford. A South African-trained physiotherapist, her research focuses on improving diabetes foot care using participatory and community-embedded approaches.

Her project brings together people living with diabetes, clinicians, allied health professionals, and advocacy leaders in Cape Town to co-design a new clinical pathway for diabetes foot screening. It ran a participatory workshop and a dialogue-based session, to generate locally relevant insights and practical recommendations to support early identification and prevention of diabetes-related foot complications. These insights now form a central component of the project’s recommendations for improving diabetes-related foot care policy, practice, and patient experience across South Africa.

Working with participatory research videographer Dr. Sarah van Borek, Jemma also produced three films: an advocacy film highlighting patient and healthcare provider testimonies; a short instructional guide to support clinicians in performing the three-component diabetes foot screening; and an educational video to help patients carry out foot care safely at home. All three videos were filmed during the same week as the workshop and released in support of World Diabetes Day on 14 November 2025. The full set of videos is publicly accessible via the Division of Endocrinology, Groote Schuur Hospital’s YouTube channel.

More information about the project.