Association between self-care management and life satisfaction in patients with diabetes mellitus

Abstract

IntroductionLife satisfaction and effective self-care management play an important role in keeping diabetes mellitus under control. The study aim was to determine the levels of self-care management and life satisfaction in patients with diabetes mellitus to explore their association and determine any predictive factors for self-management. MethodsThis cross-sectional study was conducted with 210 patients with Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus (DM) treated at a university hospital’s endocrinology clinic between February 2019 and April 2019. The data were collected using a Personal Information Form, the Self-Care Management Scale in Chronic Illness and the Satisfaction with Life Scale. To analyse the data, descriptive statistics, t-tests, ANOVA, Pearson’s correlation and multivariate linear regression analysis were utilised. ResultsThe total score of the patients with DM in the Self-Care Management Scale was 113.34 ± 17.12, while the subscale scores of the dimensions of self-support and social support were respectively 72.21 ± 11.55 and 41.08 ± 9.84. Their total score of Satisfaction with Life Scale was 18.42 ± 9.03. The two components comprising patients’ self-care management (self-support and social support), as well as total self-care management levels (r2: 0.52, p < 0.01) showed correlation with life satisfaction. ConclusionThe self-care management and life satisfaction levels of the patients were average. Diabetes self-care management is significantly associated life satisfaction levels.