Health Seeking Behavior of the Diabetic Women in Srinagar

Despite of not being a gender specific disease, females in Srinagar are found to be more susceptible to Diabetes Mellitus (DM) as compared to their male counterparts. It may be due to the fact that physical work, which once constituted a considerable part of their house hold work, has reduced substantially. This change in lifestyle has emerged as a paramount cause for the rise of this disease in contemporary society. Present study was conducted with a sample size of thirty three respondents at Sher-e-Kashmir Institute of medical Sciences, Soura (SKIMS) by means of purposive random sampling technique. Main objective of the paper in hand is to study and analyse dependency of females on their male counterparts for their treatment; to study the relation between their education level and awareness of the disease; and the burden of disease on them. It was observed that their awareness level about the disease was very low and it was a social as well as economic burden for them. More than half of the respondents had to face the stress of one disease or another in addition to Diabetes. Results of the study showed that majority of the women were dependent on one or another male member of their family with regard to deciding for the course of the treatment. Despite of having very low literacy level, majority of the respondents wanted that children should be taught about the disease from a tender age in order to make them aware of the disease.