Previously submitted to: Journal of Medical Internet Research (no longer under consideration since Feb 11, 2021)
Date Submitted: Aug 27, 2020
Warning: This is an author submission that is not peer-reviewed or edited. Preprints - unless they show as "accepted" - should not be relied on to guide clinical practice or health-related behavior and should not be reported in news media as established information.
Measuring the level of knowledge and awareness about COVID-19 among the community of a college in Dubai: A comparative study between participants of health sciences and non-health sciences backgrounds.
ABSTRACT
Background:
COVID-19 which has resulted worldwide pandemic, prompted various healthcare organisations to take meticulous measures to stop or slow down the spread of it. This included: locking down of cities, physical distancing and using various protective methods. Adherence to these measures requires the whole society to amend their behaviour, which cannot be done without having sufficient knowledge and awareness about the pandemic. Since the outbreak is a viral infection, it is expected that people with health backgrounds would have more knowledge and awareness about COVID-19. Therefore, this study aims to compare the level of knowledge and awareness of health sciences to non-health sciences faculty, staff and students at a Females College in Dubai towards COVID-19.
Objective:
This study aims to compare the level of knowledge and awareness of health sciences to non-health sciences faculty, staff and students at a Females College in Dubai towards COVID-19.
Methods:
A cross-sectional observational descriptive study was conducted using a self-administered online questionnaire to test the hypothesis. Participants were recruited via emails and/ or during their virtual lectures randomly. Results were then analyzed using Chi-square or Fisher Exact test for categorical data to compare the differences in proportion.
Results:
Findings brought to light that in general there was a high level of knowledge and awareness amongst participants irrespective of their background. The most popular source of information was the social media. Level of knowledge was significantly higher amongst the health sciences participants regarding the source of pathogen, and certain protective techniques, while they both were aware of the incubation period, symptoms, transmission routes, recovery and mortality rates.
Conclusions:
Overall, there was a high level of knowledge and awareness amongst participants irrespective of their background. Yet, there were some areas where the knowledge of health sciences group was higher than the non-health sciences group. Assessing knowledge and awareness was important to ensure that people understand and consequently change their behaviour to mitigating the spread of COVID-19.
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Copyright
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