Knowledge, attitude and practice of antibiotic use among university students: a cross sectional study in UAE

BACKGROUND: Antibiotic resistance became a marker of irrational and overuse of these medicines in many countries. This study aims to evaluate the knowledge, attitude and practice (KAP) of medical students (MS) and non-medical students (NS) towards antibiotic use in the United Arabs Emirates (UAE). METHOD: A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted amongst 1200 MS and NS from Ajman University in UAE. A self-administered questionnaire was used to assess the knowledge, attitude and practice of antibiotic use. The later was composed into knowledge, attitude and practice of antibiotic use. Descriptive analysis was used to analyse the qualitative variables while quantitative variables were summarised using mean ± Standard Deviation (±SD). A Chi-square test was used to compare differences in the proportions of qualitative variables. Unpaired student’s t-test was used to test the average differences in quantitative variables across medical and non-medical students. A p < 0.05 was considered statistically significant. RESULTS: One thousand two hundred students (MS: 600 and NS: 600) were considered valid for analysis. On average, participants scored higher in attitude score followed by knowledge and practice scores. The average attitude score was 76% (95% CI: [75, 78%]) compared to 59% for knowledge (95% CI: [58, 60%]) and 45% (95% CI: [44, 47%]) for practice. The results suggest that overall, medical students scored remarkably better than non-medical students on KAP of antibiotic use, respectively (p = 0.0001), (p = 0.000) and (p = 0.002). CONCLUSION: The students’ knowledge, attitude and practice regarding antibiotic use, which drive the practice of self-medication, reflect a gap in medical curricula in UAE institutes and medical colleges.