Knowledge, Attitude, and Practice Regarding COVID-19 among Community Health Nurses

Abstract

Background: Corona Virus Disease 2019 also known as COVID-19 is a rapidly expanding pandemiccaused by a novel human Corona Virus (SARS-COV-2). This is posing a threat at global level and needsan urgent intervention and control measures. The community health nurses are front line warriors inproviding primary health care. The knowledge and attitude greatly influences the behaviour pattern ofpeople, therefore this descriptive cross-sectional study assessed the Knowledge, Attitude, and Practiceregarding COVID-19 among Community Health Nurses at College of Nursing, Christian MedicalCollege, Vellore, India.Methods: Using total enumeration sampling method, a structured self-administered questionnairewas given to all the Community Health Nurses and data were obtained. The questionnaire assessesthe demographic and personal profile of participants, Knowledge, Attitude, and Practice regardingCOVID-19, which is developed by the investigator using the WHO module on “Emerging respiratoryviruses, including COVID-19, methods for detection, prevention, response and control” and CDC –Corona Virus Disease 2019 modules.Conclusion: This study reveals that 10.8% among the community health nurses had adequateknowledge regarding COVID-19, 44.2% had favourable attitude towards COVID-19 and 98.3% hadadequate practices related to prevention of COVID-19. There was a significant correlation foundbetween Knowledge and Practice (p= 0.002), Attitude and Practice (p= 0.001) of the CommunityHealth Nurses which was statistically significant. There were significant association found between thedemographic variables such as qualification (p=0.020) and the level of knowledge, education (p=0.015)and knowledge and years of experience of the community health nurses (p=0.009) and their attitude.