Knowledge, Attitude, Practice of Cervical Cancer Screening and Its Associated Factors Among Female Students in Hawassa Universitycollege of Medicine and Health Science Hawassa
Creators: name: Tsegaye, Shimeles
Publisher: name: National Academic Digital Repository of Ethiopia
Year: 2015

description: Background: Cervical cancer remains a major cause of morbidity and mortality among women in the world. It has been estimated that about 500,000 cases of cervical cancer occur worldwide yearly, with 85% occurrence in resource-poor countries. In Ethiopia, cervical cancer is the 2nd most common female cancer in women aged 15 to 44 years and 7,095 new cervical cancer cases are diagnosed annually. The most common factors which contribute for cervical cancer and its prevention are: inadequate knowledge about the disease, early initiation of sexual intercourse and multiple sexual partner. Therefore; basic knowledge and an early screening for cervical cancer is a key intervention in reduction of maternal deaths secondary to cervical cancer. Objectives: To assess the knowledge, attitude, practice of cervical cancer screening and its associated factors among female students in Hawassa University College of Medicine and Health Sciences, Hawassa Ethiopia 2015. Methods: A cross sectional quantitative survey was conducted using a pretested anonymous self- administered questionnaire among female students in Hawassa University College of Medicine and Health Sciences from January, 2015 to May 30. The study subjects were selected using by lottery method of simple random sampling technique and a total of 422 female students aged 18- 26 years took part in the study. Six diploma midwives were employed to facilitate data collection. The collected data were entered in using EPI-info version 3.5.1 software and exported to SPSS version 20 for further analysis. Bivariate and multivariate logistic regression analysis was conducted to examine the factors associated with knowledge, attitude and practice towards cervical cancer screening. For data processing and analysis, SPSS version 20 was used Results: overall, (76.8%) of the female students had heard about cervical cancer. Risk factors like having multiple sexual partners and initiation of sexual intercourse at early age by and Human papilloma virus were mainly reported risk factors for cervical cancer by 189 (49.7%) and 47.4% of respondents respectively. Of the risk factors, 189 (49.77% ) of students indicated that having multiple sexual partners and initiation of sexual intercourse at early age were commonly reported risk factor for cervical cancer while 180(47.4%) of them identified Human papilloma virus But only 202(53.3%) of the respondents were heard about cervical cancer screening, and almost near to half 48.2 of the respondent were not knew whether there is screening procedures to detect early stages of cervical cancer. There were poor practice of cervical cancer screening among female students. Also almost near to half 170(44.7%) of the students had negative attitude towards screening practice. Conclusion: More than half of the respondents knew about risk factors and symptoms of cervical cancer fairly and most of the students heard about cervical cancer. But most of the respondents were not heard weather there is screening methods for early detection of cervical cancer and poor practice of screening. Keywords: Cervical cancer, Cervical cancer screening, Knowledge, Attitude, Practice