PREDICTORS OF SELF-CARE MANAGEMENT OF DIABETICS PATIENTS

This study determined  the predictors of self-care  management among 340 diabetic  patients from the ten provinces in Zimbabwe, who were 35 years old and above and were chosen using convenience  sampling. The respondents were knowledgeable about diabetes and had a positive attitude towards self-care management. As revealed by the diabetic patients, medical supplies, utilities, and multidisciplinary teams were rarely available. Healthy foods were never available. It was also noted in the result that the government gave low priority to diabetes management and food policies. Further results show that the family and peer support was moderate. The results of the study established the factors that influence self-care management. These factors were found to be the availability of medical supplies and utilities, availability of healthy foods, presence of multidisciplinary  teams, attitude, knowledge, and food policies. Further results revealed that females are better at self-care management than men and those whose income are higher and are younger have better self-care management than those with lower income.