Manchester City ran out a 3-1 Premier League victory over Chelsea on Saturday
Goals from the De Bruyne, Riyad Mahrez completed a comeback at the Etihad after N'Golo Kante's first-half opener.
The victory means the Cityzens will continue to sit nine points short to League leaders Liverpool after they initially trailed them with 12 points few minutes before the game.
Liverpool won 2-1 at Crystal Palace earlier in the day to increase the gap at the top to 12 points before City's rivalry match against Chelsea.
"We don't care what happened to the other teams," De Bruyne told Sky Sports.
"It's not Liverpool, Leicester or Chelsea. We have to keep grinding, you know, what we did the last two years. We know the hard work we have to put into it.
"Obviously the other teams are catching up. It's normal. We try to maintain the level that we did but it's not as easy as people think.
"We just worked hard and we keep grinding and now we have to go up to the Champions League [against Shakhtar on Tuesday night]."