Emotional disturbances among diabetic patients in Malaysia

• Main Authors: Al-Ani, Ali Sabri Radeef, Musa, Ramli, Nik Ahmad, Nik Nur Fatnoon
• Format: Conference or Workshop Item
• Language: English
• Published: 2013
• Subjects: RZ Other systems of medicine
• Online Access: http://irep.iium.edu.my/32322/1/emotional.pdf; http://irep.iium.edu.my/32322/; http://www.iium.edu.my/irie/13/index.php/component/content/?view=featured

Background: Diabetes mellitus is a global health problem that causes significant mortality and morbidity. It is important to assess the association of diabetes with emotional disturbances symptoms like depressive, anxiety and stress symptoms so that we can detect early those psychiatric problems and treat them in order to have adequate glycemic control, less diabetic complications, improve quality of life, and good medication adherence . Despite this, emotional disturbances are consistently under-diagnosed and under-treated by physicians in general medical patients. Objectives: This study aims to determine the prevalence of emotional disturbances among patients with diabetes mellitus and to assess the severity of depressive symptoms among those patients. Methodology: This is a prospective cross sectional study conducted on a sample of 191 patients with diabetes mellitus attending the diabetic clinic at the Hospital Tengku Ampuan Afzan, Pahang state, Malaysia over a period of 10 months. The prevalence and severity of depressive, anxiety and stress symptoms were assessed in those diabetic patients by using the self-rating Bahasa Malaysia version of the Depression Anxiety and Stress Scales (DASS-42) which had been translated and validated previously by researchers (Ramli M, Ariff MF, Zaini Z). Results: The prevalence of depression was 13.6% among diabetic patients and more common among females than males and most of depressed patient had moderate depression (5.8%), while the prevalence of anxiety was 28.8%which is significantly higher in female patients and most of the patients had moderate anxiety (11.5%). The prevalence of stress was 11.5% and more among women and most of the patients had mild stress (7.3%) Conclusion: Emotional disturbances including depression, stress, and anxiety are common among patients with diabetes mellitus.