Knowledge, Attitude, and Practices Toward SARS-COV-2 Infection in the United Arab Emirates Population: An Online Community-Based Cross-Sectional Survey
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Abstract
Population's preventive practices and self-isolation is determinantal in the prevention and mitigation. This study explored the adult population's knowledge, attitude, and practice toward COVID-19 in UAE between the 4th and 14th of April 2020. The study was a community-based, cross-sectional study using a self-administered electronic questionnaire covering five different aspects: demographics, knowledge, practice, attitude, source, and trust of information, and a patient health questionnaire (PHQ-2) for depression screening. Results were analyzed using frequencies, cross-tabulation, and regression analysis. A total of 1,867 people responded to the survey. The mean age of participants was 36.0 years S.D. 10.8. Males were 19.3% and female (80.7%). Knowledge was significantly better in people with higher educational levels (B 0.17, P-value < 0.001), good preventive practice (B 0.12, P-value < 0.001), and higher perceived risk scores (B 0.053, P-value = 0.025). The best practice scores were shown by participants with older age (B 0.097, P-value < 0.05), with good knowledge (B 0.086, P-value < 0.05), were of non-UAE nationalities (B −0.08, P-value < 0.05), with jobs that cannot be practiced from home, military and health care employees (B −0.104, P-value < 0.05), had a personal history of contact with COVID-19 patients (B 0.053, P-value < 0.05), higher educational levels (B 0.052, P-value < 0.05), and a positive attitude toward taking a vaccine (B 0.088, P-value < 0.05). Depression risk was significantly higher in men, non-UAE nationals, in those with lower knowledge scores, and younger ages. The most followed practices were staying home, handwashing, avoiding social gatherings, limiting three people per vehicle, and avoiding public transportation. The least practiced measures were covering the face while sneezing or coughing and wearing masks. Although staying home was reported by 92.5% of participants, 22.6% mentioned that they were visited by more than two people and visited others in 18.4% during the last week. Social media was the source of information for 82.1% of the participants and most trusted doctors and healthcare providers. Depression risk was present in 18.9% of the participants, and most respondents (89%) agreed that SARS-COV-2 infection would be finally be successfully controlled. An encouraging finding is the willingness of two-third of the participants (64.5%) to take the COVID-19 vaccine and if it was developed, although it was very early in the pandemic. Only 14.6% said they would not take the vaccine, and 20.9% were not sure. The obtained results on knowledge and practices, although satisfactory, could be insufficient to prevent this pandemic from being contained. Therefore, we recommend the intensification of awareness programs and good practices. In addition, mental health is an area worth further studies.
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SciScore for 10.1101/2021.02.24.21252331: (What is this?)
Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.
Table 1: Rigor
Institutional Review Board Statement IRB: Statistical analysis: This research was approved by the Ambulatory Healthcare Services’ Human Ethics Committee and the Abu Dhabi Healthcare Services Central Human Ethics Committee. Randomization not detected. Blinding not detected. Power Analysis not detected. Sex as a biological variable not detected. Table 2: Resources
Software and Algorithms Sentences Resources Statistical analysis: This research was approved by the Ambulatory Healthcare Services’ Human Ethics Committee and the Abu Dhabi Healthcare Services Central Human Ethics Committee. Ambulatory Healthcaresuggested: NoneStatistical analysis was performed using SPSS StatisticsVersion 23(IBM, Armonk, USA). SPSSsugge…SciScore for 10.1101/2021.02.24.21252331: (What is this?)
Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.
Table 1: Rigor
Institutional Review Board Statement IRB: Statistical analysis: This research was approved by the Ambulatory Healthcare Services’ Human Ethics Committee and the Abu Dhabi Healthcare Services Central Human Ethics Committee. Randomization not detected. Blinding not detected. Power Analysis not detected. Sex as a biological variable not detected. Table 2: Resources
Software and Algorithms Sentences Resources Statistical analysis: This research was approved by the Ambulatory Healthcare Services’ Human Ethics Committee and the Abu Dhabi Healthcare Services Central Human Ethics Committee. Ambulatory Healthcaresuggested: NoneStatistical analysis was performed using SPSS StatisticsVersion 23(IBM, Armonk, USA). SPSSsuggested: (SPSS, RRID:SCR_002865)Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).
Results from LimitationRecognizer: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:Another limitation is that the survey was only translated to Arabic and English, underestimating the participation of speakers of other languages. Additionally, a limitation of our study is the development of an objective assessment tool of practices towards SARS-COV-2 infection. Due to the very limited time for developing our questionnaire, we measured practices by simple self-reported questions only. The UAE residents with higher education levels, good practices, and higher risk scores have good knowledge about SARS-COV-2 infection and satisfactory practices and attitude, which suggests that health education programs should aim to improve the population’s adherence to the safe practices. With the size and impact of this pandemic, lack of adherence even by a minority could be enough to prevent the pandemic from being contained. The recommendations obtained from this study are the intensification of awareness programs and interventions, and an increase in good practices. Moreover, the COVID-19 pandemic has negatively affected the community’s mental health, therefore more attention should be dispensed on the psychiatric impact of this condition and healthcare providers should consider tackling this issue when evaluating their patients.
Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.
Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.
Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.
Results from rtransparent:- Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
- Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
- No protocol registration statement was detected.
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