Knowledge towards Thalassemia and Willingness to Screen among Students in Public Senior High School 3 Bandung
Abstract
Background: Thalassemia carrier screening is a major preventive measure potentially influenced by the level of knowledge, particularly in adolescents. Therefore, this study aimed to analyze the effect of health education on knowledge of thalassemia in adolescents and its association with their willingness to do thalassemia screening.
Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted using data regarding knowledge of thalassemia before and after health education sessions from 229 students at Public Senior High-School 3 Bandung. All participants attended a one-day health education in July 2019. A questionnaire was filled in to measure their knowledge regarding thalassemia before and after the session, including knowledge on etiology and definition, risk of disease, clinical manifestations, treatment, complication, prognosis, and disease prevention. Only data with complete questionnaire responses were included. These responses were scored quantitatively and analyzed for their association with participants’ willingness to screen.
Results: Participants were knowledgeable concerning thalassemia before the health education session (median, range: 60.0, 25.0-90.0), and knowledge was increased significantly after the education session (median, range: 80.0, 35.0-100.0) with an increased median difference=19.99 (p-value <0.001). Although there was no significant association between the overall post-test score on participants’ willingness to screen (p-value >0.05), the willingness was slightly associated with improved knowledge regarding the risk of disease (OR: 1.02; 95%CI: 1.00-1.03; p-value <0.005).
Conclusion: Health education regarding thalassemia significantly increases general knowledge of thalassemia. However, improving knowledge is not significant in influencing adolescents’ motivation to take the screening tests.
Keywords
Full Text:
PDFReferences
- Wahidiyat I, Wahidiyat PA. Genetic problems at present and their challenges in the future: thalassemia as a model. Paediatr Indones. 2016;46(5):189–94.
- Betts M, Flight PA, Paramore LC, Tian L, Milenković D, Sheth S. Systematic literature review of the burden of disease and treatment for transfusion-dependent beta-thalassemia. Clin Ther. 2020;42(2):322–37.e2.
- Chapin J, Giardina PJ. Chapter 40: thalassemia syndromes. In: Hoffman R, Benz EJ, Silberstein LE, Heslop HE, Weitz JI, Anastasi J, et al., editors. Hematology: basic principles and practice. 7th Ed. Philadelphia: Elsevier; 2017. p. 546–70.e10.
- Husna N, Sanka I, Al Arif A, Putri C, Leonard E, Handayani NSN. Prevalence and distribution of thalassemia trait screening. J Med Sci. 2017;49(3):106–13.
- Rujito L, Mulyanto J. Adopting mass thalassemia prevention program in Indonesia: a proposal. JKKI. 2019;10(1):1–4.
- Rujito L. Genetic counseling in Indonesia as a mandatory service. JKKI. 2018;9(1):1–2.
- Alyumnah P, Ghozali M, Dalimoenthe NZ. Skrining thalassemia beta minor pada siswa SMA di Jatinangor. J Sistem Kesehatan. 2016;1(3):133–8.
- Wong LP, George E, Tan JA. Public perceptions and attitudes toward thalassaemia: influencing factors in a multi-racial population. BMC Public Health. 2011;11:193.
- Chien SY, Chuang MC, Chen IP. Why people do not attend health screenings: Factors that influence willingness to participate in health screenings for chronic diseases. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2020;17(10):3495.
- Rakhmilla LE, Larasati R, Sahiratmadja E, Rohmawaty E, Susanah S, Effendi SH. Assessing knowledge about thalassemia among reproductive age population after video media education. J Biomed Clin Sci. 2017;2(2):30–2.
- Karimzaei T, Masoudi Q, Shahrakipour M, Navidiyan A, J Jamalzae AA, Zoraqi Bamri A. Knowledge, attitude and practice of carrier thalassemia marriage volunteer in prevention of major thalassemia. Glob J Health Sci. 2015;7(5):364–70.
- Ngim CF, Ibrahim H, Abdullah N, Lai NM, Tan RKM, Ng CS, et al. A web-based educational intervention module to improve knowledge and attitudes towards thalassaemia prevention in Malaysian young adults. Med J Malaysia. 2019;74(3):219–25.
- Topal Y, Topal H, Ceyhan MN, Azik F, Çapanoğlu M, Kocabaş CN. The prevalence of hemoglobinopathies in young adolescents in the Province of Muğla in Turkey: results of a screening program. Hemoglobin. 2015;39(4):247–50.
- Rakhmilla LE, Susanah S, Rohmawaty E, Effendi SH. Effectiveness of an educational intervention in providing knowledge about the prevention of thalassemia: an effort to reduce new thalassemia cases. Asian J Epidemiol. 2018;11(2):59–64.
- Alkhaldi SM, Khatatbeh MM, Berggren VEM, Taha HA. Knowledge and attitudes toward mandatory premarital screening among university students in North Jordan. Hemoglobin. 2016;40(2):118–24.
- Haga SB, Barry WT, Mills R, Ginsburg GS, Svetkey L, Sullivan J, et al. Public knowledge of and attitudes toward genetics and genetic testing. Genet Test Mol Biomarkers. 2013;17(4):327–35.
- Chin JJ, Tham HW. Knowledge, awareness, and perception of genetic testing for hereditary disorders among Malaysians in Klang Valley. Front Genet. 2020;11:512582.
- Hussain I, Majeed A, Rasool MF, Hussain M, Imran I, Ullah M, et al. Knowledge, attitude, preventive practices and perceived barriers to screening about colorectal cancer among university students of newly merged district, Kpk, Pakistan - A cross-sectional study. J Oncol Pharm Pract. 2021;27(2):359–67.
- Boardman FK, Clark C, Jungkurth E, Young PJ. Social and cultural influences on genetic screening programme acceptability: a mixed-methods study of the views of adults, carriers, and family members living with thalassemia in the UK. J Genetic Couns. 2020;29(6):1026–40.
- Mat MAC, Yaacob LH, Zakaria R. Parental knowledge on thalassaemia and factors associated with refusal to screen their children. Malays J Med Sci. 2020;27(1):124–33.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.15850/amj.v9n4.2730
Article Metrics
Abstract view : 967 timesPDF - 470 times
This Journal indexed by
AMJ is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
View My Stats