An evaluation of the knowledge and attitudes that Health Care Services department students have about epilepsy

Abstract

Aim: This study was conducted to examine the knowledge and attitudes that students in the field of healthcare services have about epilepsy. Method: This cross-sectional and descriptive study was conducted with 312 students of the Department of Health Care Services (home patient and elderly care) in Turkey. The data were collected using a sociodemographic information form, the Epilepsy Knowledge Level Scale, and the Attitudes Towards Epilepsy Scale. Descriptive statistics, the Shapiro-Wilk test, the Mann-Whitney U test, the Kruskal- Wallis H test and the Spearman correlation test were used to analyze the data. Significance was consid-ered as p < 0.05. Results: Students in the field of healthcare services constituted the sample of the study, and more than half of the students (68.3%) were female. The mean scores obtained from the Epilepsy Knowledge Scale and the Epilepsy Attitude Scale were 8.38 +/- 4.29 and 60.02 +/- 7.28 respectively. A positive and sig-nificant relationship was found between the students' knowledge and attitude scores about epilepsy (p < 0.01). It was found that students' attitudes toward epilepsy positively increased as their knowledge increased. It was observed that female students who received education about epilepsy, witnessed sei-zures, and had relatives with epilepsy had more positive attitudes toward epilepsy. Conclusion: In this study, it was found that the student participants had a moderate level of knowledge about epilepsy and exhibited a positive attitude toward epilepsy. It was determined that the students' attitudes toward epilepsy positively increased as their level of knowledge about epilepsy increased.(c) 2022 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.