Background: Diabetes is a set of metabolic diseases characterized by hyperglycemia caused by improper action and/or secretion of insulin. Currently, diabetes is becoming a serious challenge in modern medicine, this disease affects 425 million people, and the forecasts indicate that by 2045 the number of cases will increase to 629 million.
Objective: The aim of the study was to evaluate the knowledge about risk factors for type 2 diabetes among secondary school students in the Silesian Province in Poland and to determine whether there are differences between the level of knowledge between girls and boys and between first-, second- and third-grade students.
Material and methods: The survey was conducted among 650 high school students. The research tool was the author's questionnaire. The obtained results were developed using Microsoft Excel 2010 and Statistica 13.3 (TIBCO Inc.).
Results: The definitions of type 2 diabetes were known to 63.9%. 91.8% of high school students indicated excessive body mass as a risk factor for morbidity, while 18.8% of people indicated the appropriate type of obesity increasing the risk of type 2 diabetes. Most of the students considered abnormal eating habits as an important factor increasing the occurrence of the disease (92.4%). The most numerous group of high school students were people with average level of knowledge (89.6%).
Conclusions: The knowledge of high school students about risk factors for type 2 diabetes was varied. The most numerous group were high school students characterised by the average level of knowledge. There were no statistically significant differences between the proportion of correctly provided responses by women and men. There were statistically significant differences between the proportion of correctly provided responses by first-, second- and third-graders. Our research shows that educational activities should be undertaken, especially about modifiable risk factors for type 2 diabetes.
Keywords: high school students; knowledge; risk factors; type 2 diabetes mellitus.
© Copyright by the National Institute of Public Health - National Institute of Hygiene.