Awareness of Diabetic Patients Regarding Foot Care

Abstract

Diabetic foot clinical complex is a common concern for diabetic patients. Typically, it affects patients with suboptimal glycemic control but it is multifactorial in origin. A diabetic foot is a condition that affects the feet of people with diabetes. It can cause skin and bone infections, abscesses, gangrene, ulcers and deformities due to nerve damage, poor blood circulation and a weak immune system. The awareness and practice of diabetic foot care among diabetic patients receiving care in Iraq is an important issue that requires attention and action. Although awareness regarding diabetic foot and its complications in our study was sufficient, participants exhibited poor practice scores. The study was descriptive cross-sectional with the purpose of evaluating the awareness of diabetic patients. This information was gathered through the use of a structured questionnaire that included the issues of daily foot inspection, hygiene, drying, footwear, walking barefoot, nail care, injury prevention and need for professional foot examination. Descriptive statistics and suitable tests of association were used to analyze the data. Awareness in the illustrative dataset used in this research framework was moderate (48.0%), good (30.0%) or poor (22.0%). There were significant correlations between age, educational level, and length of diabetes and awareness, but not with gender.