RESUMEN
Compliance/adherence of diabetic patients towards different therapeutic aspects [other than drugs] is considered one of the most important elements to control diabetes mellitus [DM]. A cross sectional study was conducted on 283 diabetic patients chosen by systematic random sample among those attending Alf-Maskan Health Insurance Outpatients clinics in East Cairo, [from April- May 2007], to assess their compliance behaviors in relation to management of their disease.Showed that most of the diabetics [61.1%] had a poor total compliance rate for the therapeutic tasks of [DM] as a whole, though the larger proportion of the diabetics [44.9%] had a satisfactory overall knowledge about the important items of DM. As regards the individual therapeutic tasks, there were also poor compliance rates concerning diet regimen, regular exercise, cessation of smoking, weight monitoring and care of eye and foot. Good compliance rate was significantly higher among patients who were males, highly educated, those of high socioeconomic level, those who had better knowledge about the disease and those who had suffered from multiple co-morbidities and suffered from DM at least ten years. Recommendations were suggested to improve patient compliance towards management tasks of the disease through health education program because increasing the information of the patients about the disease and its complications through the shared health care team including the patient himself was valuable