Knowledge of Coronavirus Disease 2019 and Practice of Prevention Protocols Among Nursing Students in South-south, Nigeria
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.60787/tnhj.v20i1.470Keywords:
Coronavirus, COVID-19, Knowledge, Myths, Practice, Prevention Protocols, Nursing StudentsAbstract
Background: Coronavirus disease 2019 is a pandemic which has resulted in the daily report of thousands of death globally. Worse still, health authorities across the globe are struggling to contain its spread.
Objectives: The study assessed the knowledge of transmission, symptoms, treatment, myths and prevention practices among nursing students during the COVID-19 outbreak.
Materials and Methods: Descriptive cross sectional study among 242 nursing students selected from 4 Universities in 4 different states in South-South Nigeria participated in the study. Online software was used to design an electronic web-based questionnaire for collecting data. Data was analyzed using frequencies, simple percentage and bar chart.
Results: One hundred and eighty six (76.9%) did not know about coronavirus before the COVID-19 pandemic and 86.8% were yet to undergo COVID-19 test. The knowledge level of 47% (lower than the acceptable cut-off of 50%) indicated a low level of COVID-19 related knowledge. Also, about 76% believed that it was unsafe to receive materials shipped from China. With regards to prevention of COVID-19, a practice level of 87.7% (higher than the acceptable cut-off of 50%) indicated a high level of practice for the COVID-19 prevention protocols.
Conclusion: Nursing students in South-South, Nigeria had low knowledge level of COVID-19 but high level of practice for the COVID-19 prevention protocols.
Recommendations: More enlightenment about COVID-19 should be conducted to improve knowledge and upgrade the current prevention and control protocols. Also, wide testing of the Nigerian populace is necessary to urgently and effectively contain the spread of the novel virus.Downloads
References
World health Organization. Coronavirus. 2020; cited 2020 March 29. Available from https://www.who.int/health-topics/coronavirus#tab=tab_1
Chughtai, A. COVID-19: In charts and maps. 2020; cited 2020 May 20. Available from https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/interactive/2020/03/covid-19-charts-maps-200310163714493.html
Mohd, H., Al-Tawfiq, J. & Memish, Z. The Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus respiratory infection: An emerging infection from the Arabian Peninsula. 2016; cited 2020 March 29. Available from https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27255185/
Poutanen, S. Principles and Practice of Pediatric Infectious Diseases (Fifth Edition). 2018; cited 2020 March 20. Available from https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/coronavirinae
Parks, E. Separating Facts from Fiction. 2018; cited 2020 March 30. Available from https://resources.finalsite.net/images/v1585609031/icsbudapestorg/sgbb89qwmfxmmammwurr/EvanParks_SeparatingFactsfromFiction_Covid-19-Facts.pdf
Khan, A. Doctor’s note: can coronavirus spread through air? 2020; cited 2020 March 20. Available from www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/ doctor-note-coronavirus-spread-air-200324075120328.html
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Coronavirus Disease 2019. 2020; cited 2020 March 20. Available from www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/symptoms-testing/symptoms.html
Centre for Education and Research in Humanitarian Action. COVID-19 scientific resources. 2020; cited 2020 March 20. Available from www.cerahgeneve.ch/resources/covid-19-free-online-scientific-resources/
Muanya, C. Scramble for COVID-19 test. Nigeria: The Guardian Newspaper of April 2, 2020. Nigeria. 2020.
Nigerian Centre for Disease Control. COVID-19 guidelines and protocols. 2020; cited 2020 March 20. Available from https;//ncdc/gov/ng/diseases/guidelines
Oyero, K. UPDATED: Nigeria records five new COVID-19 cases, total now 214. Punch Newspaper of April 4, 2020. Nigeria. 2020.
Balogun, K. World Health day for year 2020: The importance of nurses to the society. TVC News of April 7, 2020. Nigeria. 2020.
World health Organization & International Council of Nurses. State of the world’s nursing 2020: Investing in education jobs and leadership. World health Organization. Geneva. 2020.
Shaban, A. Africa Statistics. 2020;cited 2020 May 20. Available from www.africanews.com/2020/05/20/coronavirus-in-africa-breakdown-of-infected-virus-free-countries/
Nemati, M., Ebrahimi, B. & Nemati, F. Assessment of Iranian Nurses’ knowledge and anxiety toward COVID-19 During the current outbreak in Iran. Achieve of Clinical Infectious Diseases. 2020;15(COVID-19)
Kim, J. & Choi, J. Middle East respiratory syndrome-related knowledge, preventive behaviours and risk perception among nursing students during outbreak. Journal of Clinical Nursing. 2016;25(17-18):27-34.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2020 The Nigerian Health Journal
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
The Journal is owned, published and copyrighted by the Nigerian Medical Association, River state Branch. The copyright of papers published are vested in the journal and the publisher. In line with our open access policy and the Creative Commons Attribution License policy authors are allowed to share their work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
This is an open access journal which means that all content is freely available without charge to the user or his/her institution. Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles in this journal without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author.
The use of general descriptive names, trade names, trademarks, and so forth in this publication, even if not specifically identified, does not imply that these names are not protected by the relevant laws and regulations. While the advice and information in this journal are believed to be true and accurate on the date of its going to press, neither the authors, the editors, nor the publisher can accept any legal responsibility for any errors or omissions that may be made. The publisher makes no warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein.
TNHJ also supports open access archiving of articles published in the journal after three months of publication. Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g, in institutional repositories or on their website) within the stated period, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access). All requests for permission for open access archiving outside this period should be sent to the editor via email to editor@tnhjph.com.
