Knowledge, Attitude and Referral Practices of Medical Doctors towards Oral Manifestation of Diabetes Mellitus in South East Nigeria

Aims: Oral manifestations has been identified as a possible outcome associated with poorly controlled glucose levels in diabetic patients. The aim of this study is to assess the Knowledge, attitude and referral practices of medical doctors towards oral manifestations of diabetes mellitus in South East Nigeria.

Methods: This was a cross sectional study conducted among 379 medical doctors in Ebonyi State, Nigeria. A multi-staged sampling technique was used to select respondents and semi-structured self-administered questionnaire for data collection. Knowledge was assessed using 20 questions with 20 possible responses. Data was analysed using IBM SPSS version 21. Chi square test and bivariate logistic regression analysis was used to determine association between variables and statistical significance was set at p < 0.05 for all statistical associations.

Results: The mean age of the respondents was 33.2± 6.8 years. Only 21.1% of the respondents had good knowledge of oral complications of diabetes mellitus however, 83.3% had good attitude towards the condition and only 25.5% had good referral practice towards patients with oral complications from diabetes mellitus. Specialists and resident doctors had better referral practices compared to general practitioners and house officers. This relationship was statistically significant p <0.05.

Conclusion: There was average knowledge, good attitude but poor referral practices of oral manifestations of diabetes mellitus among medical doctors. There was statistically significant association between Cadre of medical doctor and knowledge of oral manifestations of diabetes mellitus as well as referral of patients with oral manifestations of diabetes mellitus. It is therefore, important to retrain younger doctors during and after medical school on oral health.