The Relationship Between Health Literacy Level and Metabolic Control Variables in People with Diabetes: A Cross-Sectional Study

Introduction: Health literacy levels of individuals are decisive in the management of diabetes, which is characterized as a widespread public health problem. This study was designed to examine the relationship between health literacy level and metabolic control variables in people with diabetes. Materials and Methods: These descriptive cross-sectional studies data were collected using a questionnaire aimed to examine the demographic and metabolic variable characteristics of the participants and the Turkish Health Literacy Scale (THLS). Data were analyzed with appropriate statistical methods in SPSS (ver. 26) program. Results: The mean total score of the THLS was 29.74 ± 9.36. The health literacy levels of the participants were found to be ‘problematic/limited’. A significant difference was found between the participants’ mean score of THLS and the variables of ‘fasting blood glucose’, ‘educational status’, ‘social media use’, ‘internet use in physician selection’ and ‘looking for complaints online’. When evaluated using multivariate analyses, the effects of the independent variables on THLS were not found to be statistically significant. The model’s adjusted R2 value was 0.123. Discussion and Conclusions: People with diabetes, who constitute the sample of this study, cannot access sufficient information about the protection and improvement of their health levels, cannot interpret the information correctly and cannot transform it into behaviors. In diabetics with a limited health literacy level, it was determined that only the ‘Fasting blood sugar’ value, one of the metabolic control variables, had a negative relationship with the health literacy level.