Knowledge, Attitudes, and Practices Regarding Prenatal Screening and Diagnosis among Healthcare Professionals in Tanzania: An Online Cross-Sectional Study

Background Prenatal screening and diagnosis are important aspects of obstetric practice that aims at identifying fetal abnormalities and thus help to improve the health of mothers and their newborns. In Tanzania, factors that include low levels of awareness, inadequate infrastructure, and non-adherence to guidelines are some of the barriers that pose a challenge to the ideal implementation of these practices. The study below aims to assess healthcare professionals’ knowledge, attitudes and practice (KAP) on prenatal screening and diagnosis in Tanzania to determine the gaps and possibilities for policy recommendations. Methods A cross-sectional study was conducted to gather data from healthcare professionals involved in antenatal care, including obstetricians, gynecologists and general practitioners. Participants were selected from both the urban and rural health facilities and stratified sampling was used. A self-administered questionnaire was used to measure knowledge of screening techniques, perception towards prenatal screening and the extent of its application. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the data collected and SPSS version 27 was used for data analysis. Results Of the 470 participants, 95.7% agreed with the necessity of prenatal screening and 86.2% of them agreed with the integration of screening in prenatal care. However, there were poor results in terms of knowledge especially with regard to the advanced screening methods, and only 11.7% of the respondents new the genetic limitations of prenatal screening. Despite the correct attitudes towards screening, the practice was not consistent and only 13.8% of the participants followed the set guidelines. Another problem was failure to refer for genetic counselling after a positive screening test result. Conclusion This paper reveals major gaps in knowledge and practice of prenatal screening among health care givers in Tanzania. Lack of training, ethical dilemmas and scarcity of resources were determined as the main barriers. Based on the findings of this study, it is recommended that educational campaigns be designed to increase the awareness of healthcare professionals, guidelines for management of screening results should be developed and established, and cultural sensitivity should be incorporated into training programs for healthcare workers.