Problematic areas of the elderly diabetic patients and their family support levels

The current study was descriptively done in order to identify problem areas of elderly diabetic patients and their family support levels. Sample of the study was composed of 218 patients who were aged ≥ 65 years and presented to Bayburt Public Hospital Endocrinology Polyclinics with diabetic diagnosis. The data were collected with "Patient Information Form", "Problem Areas in Diabetes Scale (PAID)" and "Hensarling's Diabetes Family Support Scale (HDFSS)". For the data assessment; percentages, means, Mann-Whitney U test, Kruskal Wallis Variance and Spearman Correlation tests were used. Patients' PAID mean score was 37.46±9.53. There were significant differences between PAID mean scores and sex, duration of diabetes, treatment type, duration of use of oral anti-diabetic drugs, insulin presence of complications due to diabetes, hospitalization due to diabetes within last one year and family type (p<0.05). Patients' mean HDFSS score was 57.13±13.75. Patients' mean HDFSS subscale scores were "23.01±6.11 for empathetic support", "14.00±4.96 for encouragement support", "14.25±3.68 for facilitative support" and "5.87±1.90 for participative support". It was noted that there were significant differences between HDFSS mean scores and all mean subscale scores of HDFSS and number of the people with whom patients lived at home together (p<0.05). There were significant differences between age and total HDFSS and empathetic support scores; sex and participative support score; number of children, monthly income and facilitative support score; living place and empathetic support, facilitative support and total HDFSS scores; receiving diabetes-training and empathetic support, total HDFSS scores; presence of complications due to diabetes and participative support score and receiving help due to diabetes and empathetic support, facilitative support, participative support, total HDFSS scores (p<0.05).