Knowledge, Attitudes and Practices of Diabetes Amongst Diabetes Patients at A Primary Health Care Centre in Durban, South Africa
Author(s):
Akm Monjurul Hoque*, ME Hoque, Sandhia Singh, Yugeshin Chinnasamy and Maariyah Hoque
Background: Diabetes Mellitus (DM) is considered a major public health problem in South Africa and Globally. The condition is not well-managed globally and in SA. The most important known intervention for prevention and management of DM is lifestyle modification which depends largely on the knowledge, attitude and practices of DM patients and general population. The objective of the study was to investigate the knowledge, attitudes, and practices on diabetes among DM patients.
Method: This was a cross-sectional prospective study conducted on diabetic patients attending a primary health care centre in South Africa between January to June 2018. Students t-test and ANOVA tests were conducted to find the mean difference of the knowledge, attitude, and practice scores among the demographic variables. Pearson’s correlation test was conducted to find the relationship between Knowledge, attitudes, and practice towards DM. All statistical tests were performed using two-sided tests at the 0.05 level of significance.
Results: Most of the respondents were over the age of 45 years (87%), female (74%), had no education (58%) and unemployed (52%). Results showed that DM patients had poor level of knowledge, had better positive attitudes towards DM and the respondents were practicing positively towards the management of DM. DM patients in the age group of 46-55 years were practicing better towards DM compared to patients from age group of 25-35 years. It was also found that those had no income practiced significantly better than those earning >R3001 per month (p<0.05). It was found that knowledge was moderately positively correlated with practice towards DM (p<0.05).
Conclusion: The knowledge and practice levels of lifestyle modifications and control of type 2 diabetes mellitus patients attending KwaDabeka Community Health Centre were generally poor. Nevertheless, majority of these patients have positive attitude toward healthy lifestyle habits which could potentially be harnessed and translated into healthy lifestyle practices. Health education intervention through Health Care Workers might improve the knowledge, attitudes and practices of the DM patients regarding DM.