Investigating Health Literacy Level and Its Relation with Some Factors in Patients with Type 2 Diabetes in Ahvaz -2018

Patients with diabetes need adequate knowledge of the disease due to complications of the disease and its control .The awareness is one of the effective factors on the level of health literacy. The present study aimed to determine the level of health literacy and its relation with some factors in patients with type 2 diabete. This is cross-sectional study was performed on 362 patients over 18 years of age with type 2 diabetes mellitus who referred to Diabetes Clinic in Golestan Hospital of Ahvaz. A randomized simple sampling method was used. The questionnaire included demographic and health literacy questionnaires. Data were analyzed by SPSS software version 22 using descriptive statistics and chi-square test. The age of majority of samples was 48-48 years old (% 20/71), female (% 80/62), illiterate education (% 70/54), and housewife (% 60/52). Fifty (13.8%) had adequate health literacy, 169 (46.7%) border health literacy and 143 (39.5%) had inadequate health literacy. The relationship between health literacy dimensions and demographic variables did not show a significant relationship between health literacy dimensions and the history of the disease (p = 0.225) and gender (p = 0.296). But there was a significant positive correlation between dimensions of health literacy and age (p = 0.000), marital status (p = 0.000), education (p = 0.000), occupation type (p = 0.02), type of residence (p = 0.05) and kind of cure( p = 0.000). The research showed that the health literacy of diabetic patients is borderline. On the other hand, health professionals can provide educational resources by identifying the needs and capabilities of their audience and linking health literacy with demographic variables. As health literacy is expected to increase, health-related behaviors will also be enhance. Paper Type: research article Keywords : Health literacy, Diabet, Ahvaz