Psychological impact of COVID-19 on diabetes mellitus patients in Cape Coast, Ghana: a crosssectional study

Abstract

Introduction: COVID-19 pandemic has had a greater psychological impact on patients with chronic ailments such as diabetes mellitus, tuberculosis, and HIV/AIDS compared to those without chronic conditions. We explored the psychological impacts of COVID-19 among people living with diabetes mellitus in Ghana. Methods: this study employed a hospital-based crosssectional design involving 157 diabetes mellitus patients aged 20 years and above. We assessed diabetes distress by the seventeen-item diabetes stress (DDS17) scale and COVID-19 worries by 3 specific benchmarks: “worry about overly affected due to diabetes if infected with COVID-19”, “worry about people with diabetes characterized as a risk group” and “worry about not able to manage diabetes if infected with COVID-19”. A close-ended questionnaire was used in data collection. Results: of 157 diabetic patients interviewed, the majority had type 2 diabetes mellitus with known complications and only 42.7% were managing COVID-19 symptoms. The participants showed moderate to high level of COVID-19 specific worry, moderate fear of isolation, and low level of diabetes-associated distress. About 33.8% of the study population expressed a sense of worry towards the pandemic. The logistic regression showed that age, employment status, and presence of other chronic diseases were significantly COVID-19, with a global mortality rate of 3-4%, presents with mild to severe symptoms including sore throat, dry cough, runny nose, dysphagia and occasionally with diarrhoea and vomiting [1]. The aged, immunocompromised individuals and people with pre-existing diseases tend to suffer severe complications and have a higher mortality rate when they are exposed to SARS-CoV-2 [2].