Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine
the knowledge of diabetes and self-care behavior of
patients with diabetes mellitus living in rural area.
Methods: Participants in this study were 94 patients
with type 2 diabetes mellitus. Data were collected from
July 13 to September 14, 2012. The instruments were
the knowledge of diabetes measurement developed by
Park Oh Jang and the measurement of self-care
behavior for patients with diabetes developed by Kim
Young Ok. Data were analyzed using the SPSSWIN
18.0 program for t-test, one-way ANOVA and Scheffe
test. Results: There were significant differences in
knowledge of diabetes according to education level
(p=.011), alcohol use (p=.010), regular exercise (p=.046),
and duration of illness (p=.045). There were significant
differences in self-care behavior of patients with
diabetes according to satisfaction with income (p=.031),
regular exercise (p<.001), experience with diabetes
education (p=.001), number of diabetes education
sessions (p<0.001), and complications (p=.001).
Conclusion: Based on the result of this study, there is
a need to develop and confirm the efficacy of
education programs by examining their fit to
characteristics of patients with diabetes mellitus living
in rural areas.