Evaluation of knowledge levels and attitudes of health management department students about epilepsy disease; a cross-sectional study

• Published in: Epilepsy & behavior 2022-01, Vol.126, p.108480-108480, Article 108480
• Main Authors: Gökgöz Durmaz, Funda, Cihan, Fatma Gökşin, Sevinç, İsmail, Kızmaz, Muhammet
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Attitude; Cross-Sectional Studies; Epilepsy; Epilepsy - therapy; Female; Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; Health Management; Humans; Knowledge; Male; Student; Students; Surveys and Questionnaires; Young Adult
• ISSN: 1525-5050; 1525-5069
• DOI: 10.1016/j.yebeh.2021.108480

•Health management students' epilepsy knowledge levels and attitude scores are low.•Having misinformation about epilepsy causes negative attitudes toward epilepsy.•Those who witnessed an epileptic seizure have more positive attitudes toward epilepsy.•Those who read anything about epilepsy have more positive attitudes toward epilepsy. We aimed to evaluate the knowledge levels and attitudes of the students of the Department of Health Management about epilepsy. This descriptive and cross-sectional study was conducted with the voluntary participation of 238 health management department students in their first and third years of study who were registered at the Faculty of Health Sciences summer school exam. We collected the data through a research questionnaire form and the Epilepsy Knowledge and Attitude Scales. Girls accounted for 66.6% (n = 157) all participants, 53.4% of them were 1st year (n = 127), whereas 46.6% (n = 111) were third-year students. Their mean age was 19.97 ± 1.46 years. Among these participants, 52.9% grew in the province (n = 126), 20.6% were smoking, 5% had epilepsy, and 36.6% had relatives with epilepsy. The mean epilepsy knowledge scale score was 5.64 ± 4.41 and the mean epilepsy attitude scale score was 52.55 ± 9.98. The third-year students' epilepsy knowledge score was significantly higher than their first-year counter parts (p