- CODEN : IAJPBB
- issn 2349-7750
TITLE:
KNOWLEDGE, ATTITUDE AND PRACTICES REGARDING SAFETY, TRANSMISSION AND RISK & PREVENTIVE FACTORS OF HEPATITIS C IN PAKISTAN
AUTHORS:
Hamdan ul Hassan, Muhammad Awais Butt, Hafiz Usama Shibli, Azhar Hussain
ABSTRACT:
Background: The prevalence of hepatitis C in Pakistan is possibly the second highest in the world with an estimated 10 million people (~5% of the population) affected. Factors contributing to the high HCV infection rates in Pakistan include, unsafe practices of medical equipment by healthcare providers and dentists, unnecessary clinical use of injections, unhygienic state of instrumentation at barber salons, sharing of needles by drug users and unsafe blood transfusion. Methods: This descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted in Lahore General Hospital, Lahore, Pakistan started from April 2019 and completed in August 2019. 400 people were engaged in our study after being explained with the whole study process and informed consent from them. A self-administered questionnaire was used to evaluate for various knowledge, attitude and practices regarding safety, transmission and risk & preventive factors of hepatitis C. Results: Out of 400 patients all 400(100%) patients were previously diagnosed with HCV via rapid screening or ELISA. All 400(100%) patients had also got PCR confirmation for HCV infection. Out of 400 patients all 400(100%) had previously been diagnosed with HBV via rapid screening or ELISA. 394(98.5%) patients got PCR confirmation for HBV infection and 6(1.5%) patients didn’t get confirmation via PCR for HBV infection.2(0.5%) patients had completed vaccination for HBV and 398(99.9%) patients had not completed vaccination for HBV.250(62.5%) patients had frequent therapeutic injections while 150(37.5%) patients didn’t have frequent therapeutic injections. 4(1.0%) patients were confirmed cases of STDs and 396(99.0%) patients were not confirmed cases of STDs.78(19.5%) patients had invasive medical and surgical interventions while 320(79.5%) patients didn’t have medical and surgical interventions. Out of 400 patients 298(74.5%) patients were close contact of a known case of HCV/HBV and 102(25.5%) patients were not close contact of a case of HCV/HBV Conclusions: Our study population had knowledge about the transmission and various risks and preventive factors of Hepatitis C Keywords: Hepatitis C, Knowledge and attitude
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NLM ID:101711216 [Serial]
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