Retinopathy knowledge, attitude and behavior of inpatients with diabetes mellitus and their correlation factors

Objective To explore the retinopathy knowledge, attitude and behavior of inpatients with diabetes mellitus and their correlation factors and analyzed the influencing factors. Methods This study was cross-sectional. From December 2018 to June 2019, a total of 392 inpatients with diabetes mellitus at a Class Ⅲ hospital were selected by convenience sampling and their knowledge, attitude, behavior and retinopathy were investigated with the diabetic retinopathy knowledge, attitude and behavior questionnaire and the color fundus photograph. Results Among 392 diabetic inpatients, 267 diabetic inpatients with retinopathy and 123 of them needed treatment. There were 20.9% (82/392) of patients with high-level of retinopathy knowledge, 10.5% (41/392) of them with the positive attitude and 7.9% (31/392) of them with good behavior. Multiple regression analysis showed that the related factors of the total scores of retinopathy knowledge, attitude and behavior were the retinopathy stage and diabetic course (P<0.01) ; knowledge related factors were the genders and retinopathy stage (P<0.01) ; attitude related factors were the treatment methods of diabetes mellitus, retinopathy stage and diabetic course (P<0.01) ; behavior related factor was the retinopathy stage (P<0.01) . Conclusions Inpatients with diabetes mellitus have the low levels of retinopathy knowledge, attitude and behavior which points out that medical staff should pay more attention to the improvement of the retinopathy knowledge, attitude and behavior, especially in the patients with the low levels of diabetic knowledge, family incomes monthly, short diabetic courses and without severe retinopathy. Medical staff should also make diabetic knowledge popular and improve the patients' attitudes with regular fundus examination for diabetic retinopathy to promote the good fundus examination behavior. Key words: Diabetes mellitus; Retinopathy; Knowledge; Attitude; Behavior; Influencing factors