Sobaikhi Nasser H, Alshahrani Najim Z, Hazazi Rakan S, Al-Musawa Hafiz I, Jarram Raed E, Alabah Amjad E, Haqawi Nawaf F, Munhish Fadi A, Shajeri Mohammed A, Matari Mohammed H, Salami Riyadh M, Hobani Alhassan H, Yahya Najla A, Alhazmi Abdulaziz H
Faculty of Medicine, Jazan University, Jazan 45142, Saudi Arabia.
Faculty of Medicine, University of Jeddah, Jeddah 21589, Saudi Arabia.
Diseases. 2023 Jun 2;11(2):81. doi: 10.3390/diseases11020081.
Monkeypox outbreaks in non-endemic countries emphasize the importance of being prepared to prevent its progression to a pandemic. To effectively control monkeypox, healthcare providers must have sufficient knowledge and good attitudes and practices to limit its spread. We initiated this project to assess the factors associated with health workers' knowledge and attitude toward monkeypox in southwestern Saudi Arabia.
We included 398 eligible health workers working at various health facilities. Data was collected using an online survey, and participants had an opportunity to consent. We conducted descriptive statistics for all variables and used chi-square statistics, -test, and multivariate analysis to establish the association between health workers' demographic characteristics and knowledge of monkeypox disease.
The mean age was 30.93 ± 8.25 years for the included participants, and most of them were between 22 and 29 years, male, single, nurses, working in government hospitals, and had worked for at least five years. The chi-square and -test showed that the participants' knowledge level was significantly related to age, marital status, job title, and medical practice. Most of the participants had low knowledge and good attitudes toward monkeypox prevention measures. Multivariate analysis showed that higher knowledge was associated with younger age after controlling all other significant bivariate relationships between knowledge and demographics.
This study found low knowledge levels and high good attitude levels of monkeypox among the participants. As such, there is a need to support health workers in understanding monkeypox epidemiology, prevention, and treatment. Therefore, Saudi Arabia will be making significant strides to being well prepared and ready to handle future monkeypox outbreaks.
猴痘在非流行国家的爆发凸显了做好准备以防止其演变为大流行的重要性。为有效控制猴痘，医护人员必须具备足够的知识、良好的态度和做法以限制其传播。我们启动了这个项目，以评估沙特阿拉伯西南部医护人员对猴痘的知识和态度相关因素。
我们纳入了在各种医疗机构工作的398名符合条件的医护人员。通过在线调查收集数据，参与者有机会表示同意。我们对所有变量进行了描述性统计，并使用卡方统计、t检验和多变量分析来确定医护人员的人口统计学特征与猴痘疾病知识之间的关联。
纳入的参与者平均年龄为30.93±8.25岁，他们大多年龄在22至29岁之间，男性，单身，护士，在政府医院工作，且工作至少五年。卡方检验和t检验表明，参与者的知识水平与年龄、婚姻状况、职称和医疗实践显著相关。大多数参与者对猴痘预防措施的知识水平较低，但态度良好。多变量分析表明，在控制了知识与人口统计学之间所有其他显著的双变量关系后，较高的知识水平与较年轻的年龄相关。
本研究发现参与者对猴痘的知识水平较低，但态度良好。因此，有必要支持医护人员了解猴痘的流行病学、预防和治疗。因此，沙特阿拉伯将在做好充分准备以应对未来猴痘爆发方面取得重大进展。
