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. 2020 May-Jun;14(3):189-194.
doi: 10.1016/j.dsx.2020.02.006. Epub 2020 Feb 14.

DAS: The Diabetes Awareness and Insight Scale

Julia Kim  1 , Parita Shah  1 , Lena C Quilty  2 , Fernando Caravaggio  3 , Eric Plitman  1 , Yusuke Iwata  3 , Bruce G Pollock  4 , Satya Dash  5 , Sanjeev Sockalingam  6 , Ariel Graff-Guerrero  4 , Philip Gerretsen  7
Affiliations

DAS: The Diabetes Awareness and Insight Scale

Julia Kim et al. Diabetes Metab Syndr. 2020 May-Jun.

Abstract

Background and aims: Diabetes mellitus affects approximately 8.5% of the world's population with the majority of cases diagnosed with type 2 diabetes (T2DM). Impaired awareness or denial of T2DM is a common yet understudied construct that may negatively contribute to clinical outcomes. The aim of this study was to develop the Diabetes Awareness and Insight Scale (DAS), a self-report scale that measures illness awareness in persons with T2DM.

Methods: Nine items were developed for the DAS that measure four domains of illness awareness, namely General Illness Awareness, Accurate Symptom Attribution, Awareness of Need for Treatment, and Awareness of Negative Consequences attributable to T2DM (www.illnessawarenessscales.com). A total of 100 participants with a diagnosis of T2DM were recruited using a digital data collection platform.

Results: The DAS demonstrated good convergent and discriminant validity, internal consistency, and one-month test-retest reliability. An exploratory factor analysis showed that the DAS exhibited three factors.

Conclusions: Overall, the DAS is a novel and easy-to-administer scale that comprehensively measures subjective illness awareness in persons with T2DM. As the first scale of its kind, the DAS holds promise for use in epidemiology studies to examine the extent to which impaired illness awareness or illness denial contributes to clinical outcomes and T2DM management.

Keywords: Diabetes; Illness awareness; Illness denial; Insight into illness.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of competing interest JK reports receiving research support from the Ontario Graduate Scholarship (OGS). PS reports receiving research support from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) Canadian Graduate Scholarship – Master’s. LQ reports no conflicts of interest. FC reports receiving fellowship grants from the OGS and CIHR. EP reports receiving research support from OGS and a CIHR Canada Graduate Scholarship – Master’s, and currently receiving research support from a CIHR Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship. YI reports receiving fellowship grants from Keio University Medical Science Foundation, Mitsukoshi Foundation, Japan Foundation for Aging and Health, and manuscript fees from Dainippon Sumitomo Pharma. BP reports no conflicts of interest. SD is a Banting & Best Diabetes Center (University of Toronto) Dennis Scholar and Diabetes Canada New Investigator. SS reports receiving research funding from CIHR. AGG reports receiving research support from the following external funding agencies: the CIHR, US NIH, OMHF, NARSAD, Mexico Instituto de Ciencia y Tecnología del Distrito Federal, Consejo Nacional De Ciencia Y Tecnología, Ministry of Economic Development and Innovation of Ontario, Ontario AHSC AFP Innovation Fund and W. Garfield Weston Foundation. PG reports receiving fellowship awards and research support from the CIHR, Ontario Mental Health Foundation (OMHF) and the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH).

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