Predicting of perceived self efficacy in the amount of macronutrients intake in women with metabolic syndrome - 2012

INTRODUCTION: Metabolic syndrome is a collection of metabolic disorders, which can increase the mortality rates from 20% to 80%. One of strategies to control the disease is the attention to the dietary habits. Compliance with proper diet is one of the major challenges in the management of this syndrome. Due to this fact, that the patient is responsible for the adjustment of the daily diet, it is important to identify the factors affecting the adoption of nutritional self-care. Besides, self-efficacy is considered as an important pre-requisite for this behavior because it acts as an independent part of the basic skills. This study was carried out with the purpose of determining the predictive role of perceived self-efficacy on macronutrients intake in women with metabolic syndrome. MATERIALS AND METHODS: In this descriptive study with correlational nature in 2012, there were 329 patients with the metabolic syndrome. The patients were covered by Isfahan oil industry medical centers and selected by a systematic method. In order to gather information on perceived self-efficacy, the questionnaires constructed by the researchers were used and the validity and reliability had been confirmed by the calculation of content validity indexand content validity ratio values and the indices of internal consistency and stability of the tool. The 24-h dietary recall questionnaire was also used for 3 days in order to investigate the nutritional behavior. The obtained data from the dietary recall questionnaire were analyzed by the N4 nutritional software. In this study, AMOS software version 16 was used for the structural model fitting by using the generalized least squares method besides the SPSS statistical software version 16. RESULTS: These averages obtained from the results: 2512.37 kcal energy intake, 70.95 g protein, 420 g carbohydrates and 61.61 g of fat per day. The mean of perceived self-efficacy score was 47.89. The Pearson correlation coefficient was indicated a significant inverse relationship between the perceived self-efficacy and intake of macronutrients in the metabolic syndrome. The most direct effect of the coefficient of perceived self-efficacy was observed on fat and carbohydrate intake (P < 0.05 and β = −0.592) and (P < 0.05 and β = −0.395). CONCLUSIONS: The amount of energy, carbohydrate, fat and protein were more than the recommended dietary allowances levels and the amount of self-efficacy was moderate. The present study showed that perceived self-efficacy provided a useful framework to understand and predict adherence to dietary self-care behaviors in patients with metabolic syndrome.