Knowledge and attitude of next to marry persons toward thalassemia in Mosul city

Abstract

ABSTRACT: Background Hemoglobin disorders are the most common clinically serious single gene disorders in the world. It is estimated that over 300,000 affected children are born each year, most with sickle cell disease, while about 60,000-70,000 are born with thalassemia major .Aim of the study : To determine the knowledge of next to marry couples about thalassemia and what is there attitude toward such a disease.Patients and methods : This study was a cross sectional study conducted in Mosul city, sample was taken from next to marry couples during their visit to do premarital screening at Ibnalatheer pediatric hospital (Mosul thalassemia center is one of it is departments ) and asshurqi primary health center which is the place of blood sample collection for premarital screening ( blood group ,HIV Ab , HBs Ag ,HCV AB,VDRL Test, and for High Performance Liquid Chromatography "HPLC" for Haemoglobinopathies). The actual period of data collection was from June 2018 up to December 2018, during this period 500 next to marry couples were collected randomly.Results : This study reveals that the majority of sample included in this study (79%) their ages were between (20 – 40 years) and 58.6% of the study sample was female . In relation to employment state there was 54.8% of sample not employed, about 77.8 % of them lived in urban area and about 92.4% of them was from the premarrigae group while 50.4 of the study sample have pass secondary education. This study clarified the knowledge and attitude scores of thalassemia among study population which found that about 64.4 % of the sample have adequate knowledge as they have a correct answer on 11 questions from 18 questions (61 % of the total knowledge ) and about 71 % of the study population have adequate attitude toward thalassemia as they have a correct answer on 5 questions from 8 questions (62.5 % of total correct answers regarding attitude . )Conclusions : This study revealed that 79% of the study sample's age between 20 – 40 years , 58.6% were female , 92% of the sample was from premarriage group, 54.8% was unemployed , 77.8% from urban area and 83.4% have a level of education secondary and above . In relation to their knowledge and attitude this study showed that 64.4% of the sample have adequate knowledge and 71% of them have adequate or positive attitude toward thalassemia .