Vol. 5, Issue 2, Part A (2023)

Lifestyle modification plays a crucial role in the effective management of diabetes. Diabetic patients oftentimes neglect this very crucial aspect of their management plan, which most times results in treatment failures. This study assesses the baseline knowledge of diabetic patients on the importance of lifestyle modification in the management of diabetes in Bayelsa State. It also assesses the lifestyle modification habits of these patients, drawing a reasonable conclusion on its role in relation to measured treatment outcomes. A continuous and total enumerative sampling was applied, involving 160 diabetic patients from 4 selected healthcare institutions in Bayelsa State, Nigeria. Ethical approval was sought from the Bayelsa Ministry of Health ethic committee. Data collection was by a self-administered structured questionnaire, analyzed with the aid of SPSS version 20. There were more females (53.8) than males (46.2) in the study with the majority of respondents (39.4) in the age group of 40-59 years. There was a statistically significant difference between lifestyle modification and education of the participants. Conclusively, knowledge of the role of lifestyle modification in diabetes management is low, with suboptimal lifestyle modification habits among diabetic patients in Bayelsa State. This study recommended education and awareness about diabetes among the patients.