Type two diabetes mellitus: A health beliefs study of people from Afikpo North Local Government Area in Ebonyi State, Nigeria

The purpose of this qualitative case study was to determine the health beliefs and practices in self-management of type 2 diabetes mellitus of the people from Afikpo North LGA in Ebonyi State, Nigeria. The problem that drove this study was limited knowledge and research about the health beliefs and practices of the people from Afikpo North Local Government Area (Afikpo North LGA) in Ebonyi State, Nigeria. The research questions examined the barriers that prevent the participants of the study from being compliant with their disease, in order to design a customized instructional program concerning self-management of type 2 diabetes mellitus that meets the unique beliefs and practices of this population. The results of the study revealed four specific categories: spiritual essence of the disease (SED), family commitment (FC), inaccessible knowledge (IK), and difficulty to be proactive (DP). A key finding from the analysis of these categories is the participants' need for a system that has predictability. Therefore, the Afikpo North LGA people need guidance in creating a structured realistic goal that would be part of the diabetic educational program to teach self-management. In addition, the participants emphasized the importance of having family support for their self-management. Therefore, including family participation, low literacy posters, creating diabetes awareness, simulating food shopping, one day menu planning, and step-by-step method of glucose monitoring into a diabetes educational curriculum may help to empower the people with their diabetes self-management. Teaching strategies that include one's health beliefs and practices help to shape a diabetic program that will maximize the outcome for diabetes self-management.