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Cite this article:
William Kiberenge Maina, Zachary Muriuki Ndegwa, Eva Wangechi Njenga, Eva Wangui Muchemi. Knowledge, attitude and practices related to diabetes among community members in four provinces in Kenya: a cross-sectional study. The Pan African Medical Journal. 2010;7:2 Key words: Diabetes, knowledge, attitude, practices, community, Kenya Permanent link: http://www.panafrican-med-journal.com/content/article/7/2/full Received: 13/07/2010 - Accepted: 28/09/2010 - Published: 06/10/2010 © William Kiberenge Maina et al. The Pan African Medical Journal - ISSN 1937-8688. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
Knowledge, attitude and practices related to diabetes among community members in four provinces in Kenya: a cross-sectional study
William Kiberenge Maina1,&, Zachary Muriuki Ndegwa2, Eva Wangechi Njenga3, Eva Wangui Muchemi4
1Ministry of Public Health and Sanitation- Kenya, 2National Diabetes Control- Kenya, 3Diabetes Endocrinology Center- Nairobi, 4Kenya Diabetes Management and Information Centre (DMI)
&Corresponding author
William Kiberenge Maina, Ministry of Public Health and Sanitation, P.O. Box 30016-00100, phone: +254722 334 365/+254 202717077, fax:+254 202722599, Nairobi, Kenya
Background
This cross-sectional study sought to establish the level of knowledge of diabetes among community members in rural and urban setups in Kenya and determine how this impacts on their attitude and practices towards diabetes.
Methods
A face-to-face interview was done for selected respondents using a structured questionnaire for data collection.
Results
1982 respondents, 1151 (58.1%) female and 831 (41.9%) males aged between 13 and 65 years were interviewed. 539 (27.2%) of all the respondents had good knowledge of diabetes; of these 52% had tertiary education; 25% had secondary education while 14% and 9% had primary and no education, respectively. Only 971(49%) of the respondents had a positive attitude towards diabetes while 813 (41%) demonstrated good practices towards diabetes.
Conclusion
This study indicates that the level of knowledge of diabetes in all regions in the country is very poor. It also indicates very poor attitudes and practices of the community towards diabetes. A comprehensive nationwide diabetes education programme is necessary to improve this situation.
