ABSTRACT
Introduction: Fundamental to the success of preventive measures in diabetes mellitus, is disease-related knowledge, attitudes, and practices (KAP). We aimed to assess KAP regarding type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM), nutrition and lifestyle in a community-based population of newly diagnosed dysglycemic and normoglycemic women, unaware of their glycemic status at the time of data collection. Methods: Women (2800) aged 30-45 years were screened for dysglycemia using cluster sampling from the Colombo Municipal Council area. All 272 dysglycemic detected through screening and 345 normoglycemic randomly selected from the same screened sample were enrolled. All women were unaware of their glycemic status. The sampling strategy aimed to include adequate numbers of women with altered glycemic status who were unaware of their status at the time of the study. A validated and pretested intervieweradministered questionnaire was used and analyzed using Chi-square test and student’s t-test. Results: KAP on T2DM, nutrition and a healthy lifestyle were poor, particularly knowledge on prediabetes. Some aspects of lifestyle modification were known. Women with a family history compared to those without, had better knowledge (p<0.001) and attitudes (p<0.05), but lower practice scores (p<0.05). Majority of women who found it difficult to resist foods high in fat and sugar, ate while watching television, and a higher proportion of them had a family history (p<0.001). Conclusion: Poor food-related practices observed among those with a family history, despite better knowledge and attitudes indicate a need for targeted intervention. The specific KAP related aspects identified here, can direct future intervention strategies.
ABSTRACT
Vitamin A deficiency (VAD) has been recognized as a public-health issue in developing countries. Economic constraints, sociocultural limitations, insufficient dietary intake, and poor absorption leading to depleted vitamin A stores in the body have been regarded as potential determinants of the prevalence of VAD in South Asian developing countries. VAD is exacerbated by lack of education, poor sanitation, absence of new legislation and enforcement of existing food laws, and week monitoring and surveillance system. Several recent estimates confirmed higher morbidly and mortality rate among children and pregnant and non-pregnant women of childbearing age. Xerophthalmia is the leading cause of preventable childhood blindness with its earliest manifestations as night blindness and Bitot’s spots, followed by blinding keratomalacia, all of which are the ocular manifestations of VAD. Children need additional vitamin A because they do not consume enough in their normal diet. There are three general ways for improving vitamin A status: supplementation, fortification, and dietary diversification. These approaches have not solved the problem in South Asian countries to the desired extent because of poor governmental support and supervision of vitamin A supplementation twice a year. An extensive review of the extant literature was carried out, and the data under various sections were identified by using a computerized bibliographic search via PubMed, Web of Science, and Google Scholar. All abstracts and full-text articles were examined, and the most relevant articles were selected for screening and inclusion in this review. Conclusively, high prevalence of VAD in South Asian developing countries leads to increased morbidity and mortality among infants, children, and pregnant women. Therefore, stern efforts are needed to address this issue of publichealth significance at local and international level in lower- and middle-income countries of South Asia.