Abstract
The measurement of stress levels in type 2 diabetic patients has clinical and practical meaning. In Chile, there is a lack of reliable and valid scales that allow for the right assessment of stress level among diabetic patients. The study purpose was to determine the psychometric properties of the Diabetes Distress Scale (DDS) in a sample of Type 2 Chilean diabetic patients. Several analyses including reliability analysis, exploratory factor analysis, and correlations with the depressive symptoms scale (CES-D), and the HbA1c biomarker were conducted with a Type 2 diabetic sample (n= 76) from Temuco City, Chile. The results provided a reliability of 0.74, a four-factor structure, and evidence for convergent validity with both the CES-D scale and the HbA1c marker. The DDS has acceptable psychometrics properties. It allows for the assessment of 4 factors, and has as advantage to be easy to apply in both clinical and research settings.
