Abstract:
Background: Dietary management which is considered to be one of the cornerstones of diabetes care is based on
the principle of healthy eating in the context of social, cultural and psychological influences on food choice. In
Ethiopia, there is lack of data on the dietary practice of diabetic patients which underestimates its role in the
management of diabetes. Hence, this study assesses the level of dietary practices and their associated factors
among Type 2 diabetic patients in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Methods: Institution-based cross-sectional quantitative study design was employed. A total of 403 study subjects
were included in the study. A pretested questionnaire was used to collect data. The collected data were entered
into Epi Info version 3.5.3 and exported to SPSS version 20.0 software packages for further statistical analysis. The
data were analyzed using bivariate and multivariate logistic regression. The degree of association between
dependent and independent variables was assessed using the odds ratio with a 95% confidence interval and
variables with p-value ≤0.05 were considered significant.
Results: About 46.4% of the patients were overweight and obese. More than half of the respondents (58.8%) had
FBG level ≥ 126 mg/dl. The level of dietary practice among 207 (51.4%) type 2 diabetic patients was poor. Not getting
nutrition education in hospitals [AOR = 4.47, 95% CI: (1.92,10.40)], despondency [AOR = 2.15, 95% CI: (1.14,4.02)], facing
difficulty to choose foods [AOR = 9.66, 95% CI: (5.12,18.24)], non- availability of fruits and vegetables [AOR = 2.78, 95%
CI: (1.03,7.54)], thinking about the high cost of foods [AOR = 2.36,95% CI: (1.18, 4.70)] were the factors significantly
associated with the poor dietary practice.
Conclusion: Findings of this study indicated that the majority of the patients had poor dietary practice. Therefore, the
integration of diabetic based nutrition education with motivation and home gardening is highly recommended.
