Cargando…
Cervical Cancer Screening among University Students in South Africa: A Theory Based Study
INTRODUCTION: Cervical cancer is a serious public health problem in South Africa. Even though the screening is free in health facilities in South Africa, the Pap smear uptake is very low. The objective of the study is to investigate the knowledge and beliefs of female university students in South Af...
Autores principales: | , , , |
---|---|
Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Public Library of Science
2014
|
Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4227671/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25387105 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0111557 |
_version_ | 1782343849199271936 |
---|---|
author | Hoque, Muhammad Ehsanu Ghuman, Shanaz Coopoosmay, Roger Van Hal, Guido |
author_facet | Hoque, Muhammad Ehsanu Ghuman, Shanaz Coopoosmay, Roger Van Hal, Guido |
author_sort | Hoque, Muhammad Ehsanu |
collection | PubMed |
description | INTRODUCTION: Cervical cancer is a serious public health problem in South Africa. Even though the screening is free in health facilities in South Africa, the Pap smear uptake is very low. The objective of the study is to investigate the knowledge and beliefs of female university students in South Africa. METHODS: A cross sectional study was conducted among university women in South Africa to elicit information about knowledge and beliefs, and screening history. RESULTS: A total of 440 students completed the questionnaire. The average age of the participants was 20.39 years (SD = 1.71 years). Regarding cervical cancer, 55.2% (n = 243) had ever heard about it. Results indicated that only 15% (22/147) of the students who had ever had sex and had heard about cervical cancer had taken a Pap test. Pearson correlation analysis showed that cervical cancer knowledge had a significantly negative relationship with barriers to cervical cancer screening. Susceptibility and seriousness score were significantly moderately correlated with benefit and motivation score as well as barrier score. Self-efficacy score also had a moderate correlation with benefit and motivation score. Students who had had a Pap test showed a significantly lower score in barriers to being screened compared to students who had not had a Pap test. CONCLUSION: This study showed that educated women in South Africa lack complete information on cervical cancer. Students who had had a Pap test had significantly lower barriers to cervical cancer screening than those students who had not had a Pap test. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-4227671 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2014 |
publisher | Public Library of Science |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-42276712014-11-18 Cervical Cancer Screening among University Students in South Africa: A Theory Based Study Hoque, Muhammad Ehsanu Ghuman, Shanaz Coopoosmay, Roger Van Hal, Guido PLoS One Research Article INTRODUCTION: Cervical cancer is a serious public health problem in South Africa. Even though the screening is free in health facilities in South Africa, the Pap smear uptake is very low. The objective of the study is to investigate the knowledge and beliefs of female university students in South Africa. METHODS: A cross sectional study was conducted among university women in South Africa to elicit information about knowledge and beliefs, and screening history. RESULTS: A total of 440 students completed the questionnaire. The average age of the participants was 20.39 years (SD = 1.71 years). Regarding cervical cancer, 55.2% (n = 243) had ever heard about it. Results indicated that only 15% (22/147) of the students who had ever had sex and had heard about cervical cancer had taken a Pap test. Pearson correlation analysis showed that cervical cancer knowledge had a significantly negative relationship with barriers to cervical cancer screening. Susceptibility and seriousness score were significantly moderately correlated with benefit and motivation score as well as barrier score. Self-efficacy score also had a moderate correlation with benefit and motivation score. Students who had had a Pap test showed a significantly lower score in barriers to being screened compared to students who had not had a Pap test. CONCLUSION: This study showed that educated women in South Africa lack complete information on cervical cancer. Students who had had a Pap test had significantly lower barriers to cervical cancer screening than those students who had not had a Pap test. Public Library of Science 2014-11-11 /pmc/articles/PMC4227671/ /pubmed/25387105 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0111557 Text en © 2014 Hoque et al http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ 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 properly credited. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Hoque, Muhammad Ehsanu Ghuman, Shanaz Coopoosmay, Roger Van Hal, Guido Cervical Cancer Screening among University Students in South Africa: A Theory Based Study |
title | Cervical Cancer Screening among University Students in South Africa: A Theory Based Study |
title_full | Cervical Cancer Screening among University Students in South Africa: A Theory Based Study |
title_fullStr | Cervical Cancer Screening among University Students in South Africa: A Theory Based Study |
title_full_unstemmed | Cervical Cancer Screening among University Students in South Africa: A Theory Based Study |
title_short | Cervical Cancer Screening among University Students in South Africa: A Theory Based Study |
title_sort | cervical cancer screening among university students in south africa: a theory based study |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4227671/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25387105 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0111557 |
work_keys_str_mv | AT hoquemuhammadehsanu cervicalcancerscreeningamonguniversitystudentsinsouthafricaatheorybasedstudy AT ghumanshanaz cervicalcancerscreeningamonguniversitystudentsinsouthafricaatheorybasedstudy AT coopoosmayroger cervicalcancerscreeningamonguniversitystudentsinsouthafricaatheorybasedstudy AT vanhalguido cervicalcancerscreeningamonguniversitystudentsinsouthafricaatheorybasedstudy |