Background: As an emerging epidemic of the 21st century, diabetes would threaten to overwhelm the health-care system in the coming years posing a major challenges to patients and national economies. Currently, 415 million adults are found to be diabetic which is likely to cross 642 million by 2040. Awareness and health-seeking behavior are important in the reduction of burden of the disease and its long-term complications.
Objectives: The objective of this study is to assess the awareness of Type 2 diabetes mellitus among the general and diabetic population in the rural community of Mangalore.
Materials and Methods: A Community-based cross-sectional study was conducted in rural population among subjects aged 35 years and above. Based on the prevalence rate of 16.6% by Rao et al., 226 subjects were interviewed by systematic random sampling method, and among them, 64 were found to be diabetic at the time of the survey.
Results: Of 226 persons interviewed, 28.8% were aware of symptoms, 31.9% were aware of risk factors, and among them, majority were aware of increased intake of sweets in association with diabetes, and 49.6% were aware of warning signs of hypoglycemia. Only 22.6% were aware of complications of diabetes. Mean awareness score was 21.23 among diabetics than compared with the general population, 17.07 (P < 0.05). Overall awareness of diabetes among the subjects was found to be
Key words: Awareness; Rural Population; Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus
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