Abstract:

Background: Diabetes mellitus is emerging as one of the world’s greatest health problems and its incidence and prevalence are increasing at an alarming rate especially in adolescents and young adults therefore reaching global epidemic proportions. Obesity has doubled and type-2 diabetes has increased four-fold, in the last three decades (1). With this increased incidence and prevalence emphasize has to be put on primary prevention, early detection and educational preventive programmes. This study aimed at assessing the level of knowledge about diabetes mellitus among adolescents at Relini secondary school in Dar es Salaam.

Methodology: Out of 277 students, 4% had good knowledge, 35% had moderate knowledge and 61% had poor knowledge about DM with no significant difference in level of knowledge between males and females although students in senior classes had more knowledge compared to junior classes. 57.4% identified DM as a disease of high blood glucose level but only 34.3% identified dysfunction of pancreas which produces insulin as the cause. In addition 70.8% stated the disease being caused by excessive consumption of sugar while 41.2% agreed obesity and living sedentary life being among risk factors. In case of symptoms, 30.6% identified frequent urination as a symptom, 25.6% identified increased thirsty while only 17% agreed on slow healing of wounds. Moreover 50.2% agreed that regular exercising can prevent DM while 69.7% thought that avoiding sugary food can be used as preventive measure.

Conclusion and Recommendation: Adolescent’s knowledge on diabetes is still low and possibly represents the knowledge in general population. There is a need for more education programmes in secondary schools on diabetes by well-informed teachers and other educators. Also efforts must be put towards preventing obesity in these adolescents by encouraging exercise, healthy eating habits and school sports in order to enhance the physical well-being of young population and prevent diabetes.