A cross-sectional study to estimate the point prevalence of painful diabetic neuropathy in Eastern Libya

BMC Public Health

Table 1 Characteristics of participants

Characteristic	Men	Women	Total	P value*
Sample size	226	224	450
Age (years)	49.17 ± 13.99	51.96 ± 13.67	50.56 ± 13.89	0.03^a
BMI (kg/m²)	29.77 ± 3.80	29.23 ± 4.70	29.50 ± 4.28	0.18^a
Plasma glucose**(mg/dl)	131.77 ± 25.95	128.93 ± 26.18	130.35 ± 26.08	0.17^b
Duration of Diabetes (years)	15.40 ± 7.08	14.75 ± 7.18	15.08 ± 7.13	0.26^b
Smoking (n, %)	93, 41.2%	0%	20.7%	0.00^c
Duration of smoking (years)	7.99 ± 11.71	No women smokers	7.99 ± 11.71***	0.00^b
Employment (n, %)	173, 76.5%	126, 56.3%	299, 66.4%	0.00^c
Education (n, %)
• Cannot read or write	42, 18.6%	50, 22.3%	92, 20%	0.66 ^c
• Can read and write****	19, 8.4%	36, 16.1%	55, 12.2%	0.43 ^c
• Primary	30, 13.3%	28, 12.5%	58, 12.9%	0.93 ^c
• Secondary	40, 17.7%	32, 14.3%	72, 16%	0.70 ^c
• University or above	95, 42%	78, 34%	173, 38.4%	0.27 ^c
Marital status (n, %)
• Married (no children)	37, 16.4%	28, 12.5%	65, 14.4%	0.66 ^c
• Married (children)	139, 61.5%	142, 63.4%	281, 62.4%	0.74 ^c
• Unmarried	30, 13.3%	27, 21.1%	57, 12.7%	0.44 ^c
• Others	20, 8.8%	27, 12.1%	47, 10.4%	0.72 ^c

*Differences between mean ± SD or the proportions of men and women were tested by ^a unpaired t-test, if the data was normally distributed, ^b Manny Whitney if the data was not normally distributed and ^c Chi square to test the differences in between proportions of men and women
**Plasma glucose numbers are 221 for males and 220 for females
***None of the women were smokers, so there is no mean or standard deviation for this group. Values for males only
****can read and write but not formally educated

ISSN: 1471-2458