Assessment of knowledge and practice trends about COVID-19 disease and vaccination among patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus attending an outpatient department of a tertiary care hospital

Background: COVID-19 pandemic has been the most challenging health-care crisis of modern times which has severely impacted the health-care and economic infrastructure of all affected nations. Diabetic people are at an increased risk of morbidity as well as mortality from COVID-19 infection. Efforts to stop the spread of any pandemic depend upon the people's knowledge regarding the preventive measures as well as their attitudes and healthy practices. The purpose of this study is to assess the knowledge, attitude, and healthy practices of the diabetic population in our part of the country toward COVID-19 pandemic as well as toward ongoing vaccination drive in our country. Materials and Methods: This is an observational study, face-to-face interview with the type 2 diabetes patients attending our endocrine outpatient department regarding the knowledge, attitude, and practice questionnaire. The knowledge questionnaire took into account the current knowledge regarding COVID-19 and its relationship with diabetes mellitus as well as healthy practices to be followed during pandemic. Results: Among our study population, around 78% of the participants had an average knowledge while 10% still had below-par knowledge. There was significant discordance between knowledge and healthy practices among the studied subjects. Even when patients had knowledge about the precautions to be taken, they were not following it strictly. In our study, nearly 54% of the subjects expressed confidence over the efficacy of the vaccine. Similarly, 53% of the subjects knew that they are supposed to follow social distancing norms and wear masks even after vaccination to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Conclusion: The knowledge of our diabetic population related to COVID-19 pandemic is still average. Even with average knowledge, there is a wide gap between knowledge and health practices. The attitude of the diabetic population toward vaccination is still below par which could have implications regarding vaccine acceptability.