A Survey on Knowledge and Attitude Towards Diabetes Mellitus of Diabetic Patients in Bangladesh Perspective

Abstract

Diabetes is a disease caused by flawed carbohydrate metabolism and manifests itself by unusually large amounts of sugar in the blood and urine In Bangladesh, the number diabetic patient has also increased due to lack of knowledge & impropriate attitude. There is little work done on diabetes mellitus as well as knowledge and attitude towards Diabetes mellitus of diabetic patients in Bangladesh. The purpose of our study was to see the current statistics of knowledge and attitude towards Diabetes mellitus of diabetic patients. The study was a survey based study. The survey was performed on 202 diabetic patients in BIRDEM (Bangladesh Institute of Research and Rehabilitation for Diabetes, Endocrine and Metabolic Disorders) at Shahbag, Dhaka, BIRDEM at Rampura,Dhaka and Baridhara park. In this study 51.44% male and 48.55% female participants were found. Patients were selected randomly. We considered factors affecting diabetes knowledge were sex, age, level of education, marital status, profession, and income, mode of diagnosis and duration of diabetes. Only Diabetic patients were selected as study population. Approximately 96.53% of them were married and 3.96% were single. The study also showed that the maximum percentage (20.79%) of normal range of fasting blood glucose level was 4.1-6 mg/ml and the maximum percentage (33.66%) normal range of random blood glucose level was 8.1-12mg/ml. But Knowledge about HbA1c is very poor and maximum (72.27%) of the study population were not even heard of name of HbA1c or glycosylated hemoglobin. In our study showed that 55.44% study population has knowledge about diabetes. Our study also showed that people in Bangladesh frequency of visiting healthcare provider has raised alarmingly, 71.78% patients visit healthcare provider more than twice in a year, 22.77% visit twice in a year and 78.71% of study populations have knowledge about Risk factors of Diabetes. We found that people are more cautious about their diabetes condition. They know the sign and symptoms and management practice of diabetes in hyperglycemic and hypoglycemic condition. In spite of that Government & society should take proper and powerful steps to decrease the number of diabetic patients by creating awareness among mass population.