Knowledge Regarding Diet, Physical Activity and Medication among Patients Diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus

Introduction: Type 2 diabetes mellitus is a highly prevalent disease which is chronic and lifelong and requires a high degree of patient compliance with regard to medication and life style changes. A good knowledge regarding these will be of value. Therefore we aimed to assess the knowledge regarding diet, physical activity and medication in patients diagnosed with type 2 diabetes mellitus attending the diabetes clinic, Teaching Hospital Peradeniya.
Methods: This is a descriptive, cross sectional study, recruited 400 outpatients attending the diabetes clinic at Teaching hospital Peradeniya. The knowledge regarding diet, physical activity and medication among type 2 diabetes mellitus patients was assessed using an interviewer administered questionnaire.
Results: Half the sample had a good level of knowledge regarding dietary recommendations, with younger age group (p< 0.05), females (p< 0.001) and a high level of education (p <0.005) having better knowledge. A good knowledge regarding physical activity was observed only in 20.8%, with high scores observed in males below 50 years of age with a high education level (p<0.05). 78.0% of the participants had a good knowledge about medication, with males (p< 0.01) and patients with longer disease duration had a significantly higher level of knowledge (p<0.005). Males had a slightly higher mean percentage total score (70.5188) than the females (69.8588) however the difference was not significant.
Conclusion: knowledge levels are satisfactory with regard to diet and medication, however more detailed  knowledge regarding recommended food groups are needed. Knowledge on physical activity is not complete and needs attention.