F O Erah
,
M Egwu,
E C Aniaku,
C M Ajoku
For correspondence:- F Erah Email: francozenith@yahoo.com Tel: +2348033546812
Published: 30 December 2020
Citation: Erah FO, Egwu M, Aniaku EC, Ajoku CM. Knowledge, attitude and preventive measures towards Lassa fever amongst students living in the hostel in a tertiary institution in South South Nigeria. Trop J Med Dent Pract 2020; 1(2):73-78 doi: https://doi.org/10.47227/tjmdp/v1i2.3
© 2020 The author(s).
This is an Open Access article that uses a funding model which does not charge readers or their institutions for access and distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0) and the Budapest Open Access Initiative (http://www.budapestopenaccessinitiative.org/read), which permit unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited..
Background: Lassa fever is an acute, viral virulent hemorrhagic fever with high morbidity and mortality rates. It is common in slum communities in Africa where poverty prevails and standard of living is low, overcrowding subsists and rodents often move from house to house, spreading the virus. The purpose of this study was to determine the knowledge, attitude and preventive measures against Lassa fever by students living in the hostel within the current epicenter of the viral infection in Nigeria.
Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional design was utilized for this study and participants were selected using cluster sampling technique with proportional allocation to sample size. Data on knowledge, attitude and preventive measures against Lassa fever by students living in the hostel within the current epicenter of the viral infection in Nigeria were collected with interviewer-administered questionnaire. Chi square test was used to compare categorical data as appropriate and level of significance set at p < 0.05
Results: Out of the 242 respondents interviewed, about half of them (55.8%) had good knowledge of Lassa fever. Few of them (2.48%) had good attitude towards Lassa fever while a small proportion (5.79%) had good practice of preventive measure against Lassa fever.
Conclusion: While majority of the students had good knowledge of Lassa fever, most of them had poor attitude and poor practice of prevention of the disease.
