Diabetes mellitus: Implication in rural area of Thane district, India

Abstract Context: Diabetes mellitus along with its complications contribute a significant amount of burden on the society. Lack of awareness has resulted in an increased number of diabetics over the years. Aims: To study the sociodemographic status, complication profile and perception of diabetic patients regarding their illness. Settings and Design: Cross sectional center based study done on 110 type 2 diabetic patients over a period of 5 months at rural health training center. Materials and Methods: Universal sampling technique was used. All old and newly diagnosed diabetic patients were interviewed by Face to Face interview method. Statistical Analysis: Descriptive statistics for sociodemographic factors and morbidity; cross tabulation by using test of significance to find association between different variables were used. Results: 50% patients were illiterate, 91.82% were married and 44.5% were farmers. The perception of self-health was reported GOOD on Stanford patient education research center questionnaire scale in 62.7% patients; these responses were significantly associated with males. 61.81% patient had symptoms of coronary heart disease (CHD). 87.3%, 59.1%, and 58.2% patient had symptoms of neuropathy, nephropathy and retinopathy respectively. Out of 61 patients who were aware of complications only 1/10 th were aware with the fact that diabetes can affect eye and heart. Conclusions: Almost half patients were unaware that disease is associated with complications and in remaining halves awareness was negligible for neuropathy and nephropathy. In contrast around 2/3 rd patients had symptoms of CHD, nephropathy and retinopathy.