Non-Adherence to Insulin Therapy and Quality of Life in Diabetic Patients from a Public Hospital in Lima, Peru

Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus (T2DM) is a chronic condition with a high rate of cases globally that requires continuous treatments such as insulin therapy, whose adherence influences the domain of the disease and the quality of life of patients. The objective of this study was to determine the relationship between non-adherence to insulin therapy and quality of life in diabetic patients from a public hospital in Lima, Peru. A quantitative, non-experimental, correlational and cross-sectional study was conducted. The sample consisted of 133 adult patients with DM2 from a hospital in Lima, who received insulin treatment. To collect data, the MMAS-8 scale was used to assess non-adherence to insulin therapy treatment and the EQ-5D-5L questionnaire was used to measure quality of life. The descriptive results revealed that 91.7% of patients showed non-adherence to treatment with minimum insulin and 52.6% had a medium quality of life. Inferential analysis performed with Spearman's Rho test showed an inverse, moderate, and significant correlation between non-adherence to insulin therapy and quality of life (r = -0.451; p < 0.05). It is concluded that the greater the non-adherence to insulin therapy, the lower the quality of life among diabetic patients in a public hospital in Lima, Peru.