Adherence to self‐care and glycaemic control among people with insulin‐dependent diabetes mellitus

• Published in: Journal of Advanced Nursing
• Main Authors: Toljamo, Maisa, Hentinen, Maija
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Wiley 2001
• Subjects: Northern Finland; Lapland
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1046/j.1365-2648.2001.01808.x; https://api.wiley.com/onlinelibrary/tdm/v1/articles/10.1046%2Fj.1365-2648.2001.01808.x; https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1046/j.1365-2648.2001.01808.x

Adherence to self‐care and glycaemic control among people with insulin‐dependent diabetes mellitus Aim of the study. Factors associated with adherence to self‐care and glycaemic control were studied in 213 people with insulin‐dependent diabetes mellitus using a self‐report questionnaire and a biochemical indicator (glycosylated haemoglobin). Methods. The data were collected in the Oulu Health Center and the Central Hospital of Lapland in Northern Finland. The response rate was 76%. In order to verify the reliability and validity of the instruments, we used correlation coefficients, factor analysis and item‐total analysis. Internal consistency was checked by Cronbach’s α. The connections between self‐care and the background variables were examined by cross‐tabulation. Findings. The majority of subjects accomplished their insulin treatment as scheduled, but had more difficulties with the other aspects of self‐care. According to the findings, a fifth (19%) of the respondents were neglecting their self‐care. The others undertook flexible (46%), regimen‐adherent (16%) or self‐planned self‐care (19%). The subjects who were adherent to self‐care had better metabolic control than those who neglected self‐care. According to logistic regression analysis, poor metabolic control ( P =0·003), smoking ( P =0·009) and living alone ( P =0·014) were associated with neglect of self‐care. Gender, concurrent diseases and complications as a result of diabetes increased the risk, but had no significant association with adherence to or neglect of self‐care. Conclusion. The findings demonstrated that adherence to self‐care does not always lead to good metabolic control, but neglect of self‐care is likely to lead to poor metabolic control.