[Diabetes Knowledge Test Feasibility in Portugal].

INTRODUCTION

Given the rising incidence of type 2 diabetes and taking into account that much of its control depends on the patient's attitude towards his illness, loomed the need to equip health professionals with capable tools to determine the educational needs of their patients, allowing a more personalized intervention to correct habits that could be harmful to the diabetics' health.

OBJECTIVE

Verify the Diabetes Knowledge Test reliability in Portugal. Analysis of socio-demographic and pathologic variables' correlation with the number of correct answers in the test.

MATERIAL AND METHODS

Application of the translated version of Diabetes Knowledge Test to a convenience sample of a primary care center in Covilhã.

RESULTS

In general, the questions obtained a Cronbach's alpha > 0.800. Diabetics with better results in the survey proved to be more compliant, with a positive relationship between knowledge and diabetes' control. However, only 9.2% of diabetics have good knowledge about their disease, and the majority (65.8%) shows an average one. The insulin treated patients show the worst results (77.6% with low knowledge). The variables 'treatment route' and 'complications' show statistical impact on the level of knowledge that diabetics have about their pathology (p values 0.00 and 0.048, respectively). Inhabitants of rural areas, without complications secondary to diabetes and treated orally, proved to be more compliant and to have better knowledge about the disease.

DISCUSSION

Contrary to previous studies, variables such as age and educational level showed no relation with the performance in the survey. Inhabitants of the rural area and diabetics treated orally obtained better results than what had been previously advocated.

CONCLUSION

It has been proved the moderate to high psychometric reliability of the test, as its value establishing a correlation between diabetes knowledge and control. It is expected that its future application will help identifying the reasons for uncontrolled diabetics, allowing a more individualized intervention by the health professionals.