Knowledge Assessment of Alzheimer’s disease among the Hospital Health Staff in Chittagong, Bangladesh.

Abstract

The prevalence of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is less in Bangladesh and there also exists limited awareness among the people. However, with the fast-growing population aging, the global prevalence of AD is predicted to rise and Bangladesh is no less an exception to this global upsurge of Alzheimer’s disease. Health staff plays a vital role in the management of the disease, understanding the progression, and providing appropriate care for the patients. With the lack of awareness of Alzheimer’s disease in the country, the AD knowledge among the health staff is yet to be known. Therefore, this study aims to assess Alzheimer’s disease knowledge among the health staff from two different hospitals in Chittagong. Also, given that there was no previous research done in Bangladesh to explore the AD knowledge among health caregivers, this reason further gives grounds for conducting the study. A cross-sectional study was conducted with 95 study participants in total, 51 female and 44 male. Among these participants, the numbers of nurses, health assistants, and interns were 36, 34, and 25 respectively. The knowledge level was measured using a standard Alzheimer’s disease knowledge scale (ADKS) that consisted of 30 true/false questions. It was found that nurses and interns had better AD knowledge compared to health assistants, who obtained significantly poor scores on the standard ADKS. The health staff claiming to have attended AD patients had slightly better knowledge in comparison to non-AD caregivers. However, participants having AD relatives did not show remarkable knowledge compared to participants who did not have AD relatives or were not sure about having AD relatives. The educational level and service duration of the health staff were not found to affect their knowledge level. Overall, average knowledge was revealed among the participants with a mean score of 15.2 out of 30. Although moderate knowledge level was demonstrated by the health staff, the score still indicates the lack of awareness and the need for appropriate AD-specific education training for them.