| dc.description.abstract | The health crisis due to COVID-19 has escalated all over the world since the end of
2019. The people are advised to adhere to preventive measures such as social
distancing, wearing masks and regular washing of hands. Therefore, this study
aimed to evaluate knowledge, attitude, and practices (KAP) on COVID-19 among
undergraduates to improve their awareness of averting COVID-19. A cross-sectional
study was conducted among undergraduates of the Faculty of Allied Health Sciences
(FAHS), Kotelawala Defence University. Students from all the intakes of FAHS
(n=576) were included. An online validated self-administered questionnaire was
used to collect data after the ethical approval. The mean percentages of KAP and the
scores were calculated. The score scale of Berihun et al., 2021 was used to assess
KAP. The knowledge scored ≥9.6 and <6.0 were considered as good and poor
knowledge. The attitude scored ≥8 and <8 considered as positive and negative
attitudes. The practices scored ≥8 and <8 considered as good and poor practices
respectively. The female population was 72.9%, and 27.1% were male. The majority
of the population (94.0%) had good knowledge. Positive attitudes were expressed
by 65.3% of undergraduates while 82.8 % had good practices. Statistically
significant associations (p<0.05) were observed between knowledge and the
streams (p=0.002), attitudes and gender (p=0.045), practices with the study year
(p=0.040), gender (p=0.000) and sources of information used (p=0.045). This study
infers that FAHS undergraduates had good KAP toward COVID-19. Conducting
awareness programs and displaying posters on preventive measures against Covid-
19 would be beneficial to further improve the KAP. | en_US |
