TY - JOUR
T1 - Knowledge, attitude, and practice related to the COVID-19 pandemic among undergraduate medical students in Indonesia
T2 - A nationwide cross-sectional study
AU - Adli, Imam
AU - Widyahening, Indah Suci
AU - Lazarus, Gilbert
AU - Phowira, Jason
AU - Baihaqi, Lyanna Azzahra
AU - Ariffandi, Bagas
AU - Putera, Azis Muhammad
AU - Nugraha, David
AU - Gamalliel, Nico
AU - Findyartini, Ardi
N1 - Funding Information:
AF received funding from the Indonesian COVID-19 Research and Innovation Consortium (grant number: 132/FI/P-KCOVID-19.2B3/IX/2020) organized by the Indonesian Ministry of Research and Technology/National Research and Innovation Agency. The funder had no role in the study conception, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 Adli et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
PY - 2022/1
Y1 - 2022/1
N2 - Introduction The potential role of medical students in raising awareness during public health emergencies has been acknowledged. To further explore their potentials as public educators and role models for the communities during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, this study aims to assess the knowledge, attitude, and practice of these students toward COVID-19. Methods An online cross-sectional survey was conducted among undergraduate medical students in Indonesia. Socio-demographics characteristics, social interaction history, information-seeking behavior, as well as knowledge, attitude, and practice toward COVID-19 were collected through a self-reported questionnaire. A p-value of <0.05 indicated statistical significance. Results Out of 4870 respondents, 64.9% had positive attitude and 51.5% had positive practice toward COVID-19, while only 29.8% had adequate knowledge. Knowledge was slightly positively correlated with attitude and practice (ρ = 0.074 and ρ = 0.054, respectively; both p<0.001), while attitude was weakly correlated with practice (ρ = 0.234, p<0.001). Several factors including age, sex, place of residence, institution type, academic level, family income, history of chronic illness, prior volunteering experience, and perceptual awareness on COVID-19 were significantly associated with either knowledge, attitude, and/or practice toward COVID-19. Furthermore, health institution's and the government's press releases, as well as health expert opinions were deemed as the most reliable sources of COVID-19-related information-yet trivially none of these sources were associated with knowledge, attitude, and practice in the study population. Conclusion Many undergraduate medical students in Indonesia had positive attitude and practice against COVID-19, yet only a few had adequate knowledge. This warrants further interventions to keep them updated with COVID-19 evidence to maximize their potentials in raising public awareness on COVID-19.
AB - Introduction The potential role of medical students in raising awareness during public health emergencies has been acknowledged. To further explore their potentials as public educators and role models for the communities during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, this study aims to assess the knowledge, attitude, and practice of these students toward COVID-19. Methods An online cross-sectional survey was conducted among undergraduate medical students in Indonesia. Socio-demographics characteristics, social interaction history, information-seeking behavior, as well as knowledge, attitude, and practice toward COVID-19 were collected through a self-reported questionnaire. A p-value of <0.05 indicated statistical significance. Results Out of 4870 respondents, 64.9% had positive attitude and 51.5% had positive practice toward COVID-19, while only 29.8% had adequate knowledge. Knowledge was slightly positively correlated with attitude and practice (ρ = 0.074 and ρ = 0.054, respectively; both p<0.001), while attitude was weakly correlated with practice (ρ = 0.234, p<0.001). Several factors including age, sex, place of residence, institution type, academic level, family income, history of chronic illness, prior volunteering experience, and perceptual awareness on COVID-19 were significantly associated with either knowledge, attitude, and/or practice toward COVID-19. Furthermore, health institution's and the government's press releases, as well as health expert opinions were deemed as the most reliable sources of COVID-19-related information-yet trivially none of these sources were associated with knowledge, attitude, and practice in the study population. Conclusion Many undergraduate medical students in Indonesia had positive attitude and practice against COVID-19, yet only a few had adequate knowledge. This warrants further interventions to keep them updated with COVID-19 evidence to maximize their potentials in raising public awareness on COVID-19.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85123352628&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1371/journal.pone.0262827
DO - 10.1371/journal.pone.0262827
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85123352628
VL - 17
JO - PLoS ONE
JF - PLoS ONE
SN - 1932-6203
IS - 1 January
M1 - e0262827
ER -
