Knowledge, attitude, and practices associated with type 2 diabetes mellitus among patients attending a tertiary health facility in North-East Nigeria

Abstract

Background: Poor management of diabetes mellitus (DM) has resulted in increased morbidity and mortality among patients. Likely factors contributing to this trend include inadequate knowledge, attitude, and diabetes management practices among patients. Aim: This study was therefore designed to assess the knowledge, attitude, and practices associated with type 2 DM in patients attending Federal Medical Center, Jalingo Taraba State. Materials and Methods: The study was a cross-sectional study carried out among 286 type 2 diabetes patients selected purposively. A validated questionnaire was used to collect the data, and it comprised of four sections, namely sociodemographic characteristics, knowledge of DM, attitude toward DM, and DM management practices. The collected data were entered into IBM SPSS 23.0 and were analyzed using the descriptive and inferential statistics with the level of significance set at 0.05. Results: Most of the respondents 104 (35.62%) were aged 50–59 years and 163 (55.8%) were females. Besides, 89.0% of the respondents demonstrated good knowledge of DM, whereas 56.8% exhibited good attitude toward DM and 81.8% demonstrated good DM management practices. Knowledge of DM showed a significant association with attitude and practice of DM management (P < 0.05). Conclusion: Knowledge, attitude, and practice remain vital in the management of DM and prevention of complications. Therefore, more efforts must be channeled into improving and sustaining the knowledge, attitude, and practices of patients to improve their quality of life.