The article looks into Diabetes Distress (DD)—an emotional or affective state arising from the challenge of living with diabetes and the burden of self-care—which negatively impacts diabetes management and the quality of life of T2DM patients. Early detection and management of DD is key to efficient T2DM management. The study aimed at developing a valid and reliable instrument for Bangladeshi patients as the unavailability of such a tool poses a challenge in diabetes care. Linguistically adapted, widely used, 17-item Diabetes Distress Scale (DDS), developed through forward–backwards translation from English to Bengali, was administered to 1184 T2DM patients, from four diabetes hospitals in Bangladesh. Psychometric assessment of the instrument included construct validity using principal component factor analysis, internal consistency using Cronbach’s α and discriminative validity through independent t-test and test–retest reliability using intraclass-correlation coefficient (ICC) and Kappa statistics. Factor analysis extracted 4 components similar to the original DDS domains, confirming the construct validity. The scale demonstrated satisfactory internal consistency (α = 0.838), stability (test–retest ICC = 0.941) and good agreement across repeated measurements (Kappa = 0.584). Discriminative validity revealed that patients with complications (p < 0.001) and those on insulin (p < 0.001) had significantly higher distress scores in all domains. Bengali version of DDS is a valid and reliable tool for assessing distress among Bangladeshi T2DM patients.
Authors: Akter, Jesmin; Islam, Rakibul M.; Chowdhury, Hasina Akhter; Selim, Shahjada; Biswas, Animesh; Mozumder, Tanvir Ahmed; Broder, Jonathan; Ilic, Dragan; Karim, Md Nazmul
Type: Journal article
Year: 2022
