A Study Of The Behavioral Aspects Of Diabetes Disease Management

Abstract

As per WHO (2014) 347 million people worldwide suffer from diabetes. The prevalence of disease is increasing at an alarming rate. 8% of Maharashtra’s population is presently suffering from Diabetes with rapidly increasing rate of nearing to 20% by 2020. It is although more important to be aware of the disease and not be in the world of myths. Diabetes is mainly due to stress and the hereditary which cannot be changed at this time, whereas stress related can be overcome through lifestyle management. The paper addresses the awareness level and ongoing myths about the disease along with the study of present lifestyle of Mumbai residents. The respondents were suffering from diabetes had come to OPD of a tertiary care hospital of Mumbai hence the data is valid. The results of the study revealed that respondents had lot of myths regarding diabetes with respect to eating habits and wrong notion of exercise which is a component of poor lifestyle. The Factor Analysis helped in extracting the factors of awareness level of diabetic patients with respect to eating habits and followed their doctor’s advice whereas when it comes to behavior pertaining to exercise followed was very low. Another interesting result which came out was respondents who were non diabetic were fully aware about the symptoms as one of their family members was diabetic. Also it was revealed that although respondents were aware about the disease management but their behavior towards managing the same was very poor in terms of regular exercise.