Living with diabetes in rural and urban Ghana: A critical social psychological examination of illness action and scope for intervention

Current chronic illness research in Africa neglects the social psychological dimensions of illness experiences that present more appropriate frameworks for intervention. Informed by social representations theory, links between social knowledge of diabetes, illness experience and illness action were examined through semi-structured individual interviews with rural and urban Ghanaians with diabetes. All respondents drew interchangeably from commonsense, scientized, and religious knowledge modalities in defining health, illness and diabetes. Diabetes caused disruption to: body-self, social identity, family/social relationships, economic circumstance and nutrition. Commonsense and scientized notions of health, illness and diabetes framed illness action goals that merged with biomedical goals, specifically drug and diet management. These goals were compromised by the nature, severity and duration of disruption(s) and emotional responses evoked. The paper dicusses implications of the findings and outlines recommendations for interventions that span individual/group, community and structural dimensions.