Awareness, Attitude and Knowledge about Thalassemia among Students of Different Disciplines

Abstract

Objective: This study was conducted to determine awareness, attitude, and knowledge about thalassemia among the students of urban educational institutions of Rawalpindi/Islamabad. Study Design: A cross sectional study. Place and Duration of Study: Institutions of Rawalpindi and Islamabad from December 2018 to June 2019. Materials and Methods: There were four major groups of students, which included newly inducted Medical students, FSC. students, Engineering students and students of Biomedical Sciences. A questionnaire consisting of 20 YES/NO responses and 6 multiple choice questions was given. SPSS 23.0 software was used for analysis of data using frequency and chi-square tests and p<0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results: Among the 500 subjects recruited in this cross-sectional study, a total of 434(86.8%) had some idea about thalassemia. The p-value was less than 0.05 (p<0.05) The range of percentage of correct answers was between 35.6% (about iron rich diet) and 95.2% (about the affected cells). The attitudinal patterns of all the students towards thalassemia revealed that 93.2% students wanted to be informed about the disease at their respective institution. 90.6% were willing to learn their carrier status and 91.4% were ready to amend their future in case of risky prospects. Conclusion: The awareness regarding the general aspects of thalassemia is reasonably sufficient among the students in urban educational institutions of Rawalpindi/Islamabad, there is some level of disparity in the degree of knowledge between different groups of students. There is need of sessions based on knowledge of thalassemia among non-medical students also.

Keywords

• thalassemia, awareness, gene disorder, prevention, premarital screening.