Responsiveness to Structured Teaching Programme on Prevention of Hepatitis ‘A’ among Adults

Background: Globally around 1.5 million symptomatic Hepatitis 'A' cases occur each year with likely tens of millions of infections. Hepatitis A virus (HAV) is responsible for considerable morbidity and economic losses to under developing countries like India. Objectives: To assess the effectiveness of structured teaching programme of knowledge on prevention of Hepatitis A among the adults. Design: A one group pre test and post test Pre experimental design was adopted for the study. Setting: Thandalam village at Kanchipuram District. Participants: 100 adults with fulfilling the inclusion criteria were selected by convenient sampling. Methods: A pre test was conducted by using knowledge questionnaire related to hepatitis A. Immediately after pre test structured teaching programme was given to the adults about prevention of hepatitis A for 7 days and 8th day post test was conducted to assess the effectiveness of structured teaching programme. Collected data was analysed by using descriptive and inferential statistics. Results: In pre test, 67 (67%) had inadequate knowledge and 33 (33%) had moderately adequate knowledge whereas in post test, 82(82%) adults had adequate knowledge and 18(18%) had moderately adequate knowledge. By comparing pre test and post test knowledge score, structured teaching programme improved their knowledge on prevention of Hepatitis 'A' with statistical significance P<0.05. There was a statistically no significant association found between the post test scores of the sample with their demographic variables. Conclusion: The findings imply the need for educating adults on effective management of prevention of hepatitis A. An Education should be extended to the urban slum adults also.