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Awareness and Knowledge of the Effect of Ultraviolet (UV) Radiation on the Eyes and the Relevant Protective Practices: A Cross-Sectional Study from Jordan

Background: Overexposure to ultraviolet (UV) radiation is linked to serious adverse health effects that are cumulative in nature and affect children more than adults. UV radiation has also been reported to have serious complications for the eye, particularly in areas with a high UV radiation index....

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Autores principales: Alebrahim, Mohammad A., Bakkar, May M., Al Darayseh, Abdulla, Msameh, Aya, Jarrar, Dana, Aljabari, Saja, Khater, Walla
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9778245/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36553938
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/healthcare10122414
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author Alebrahim, Mohammad A.
Bakkar, May M.
Al Darayseh, Abdulla
Msameh, Aya
Jarrar, Dana
Aljabari, Saja
Khater, Walla
author_facet Alebrahim, Mohammad A.
Bakkar, May M.
Al Darayseh, Abdulla
Msameh, Aya
Jarrar, Dana
Aljabari, Saja
Khater, Walla
author_sort Alebrahim, Mohammad A.
collection PubMed
description Background: Overexposure to ultraviolet (UV) radiation is linked to serious adverse health effects that are cumulative in nature and affect children more than adults. UV radiation has also been reported to have serious complications for the eye, particularly in areas with a high UV radiation index. Increasing public awareness about the harmful effects of UV radiation on the eye and promoting awareness about protection against UV radiation may prevent eye disease related to UV radiation damage and help in the improvement of public health in general. This study aims to assess public awareness and knowledge of UV radiation and practices toward UV protection in Jordan, which is a country recognized as having a relatively high UV index throughout the year. Methods: A cross-sectional study was performed using an online questionnaire using Google Forms(®) to assess people’s awareness, knowledge, practices toward eye protection from UV radiation, and the reasons for not wearing UV-protective eyeglasses in Jordan. Sociodemographic information of participants including age, gender, education level, and employment status was also acquired. People’s knowledge on UV protection and harmfulness was measured via rewarding their correctly answered knowledge questions with one mark and zero for incorrectly answered questions based on key answers defined from the literature. Results: A total of 1331 participants (77% females and 23% males) with an average age of 26(±10) years completed the online questionnaire. Participants showed generally high levels of knowledge and awareness about UV radiation and its harmful effects. Nevertheless, participants showed a low level of knowledge about the link between UV radiation and some of the ocular diseases in the questionnaire. Practices toward UV radiation protection where inadequate, with 59% of the respondents reporting that they do not use any protective eyewear from natural UV radiation. The main reported reason for not wearing UV-protective sunglasses was uncertainty in the efficiency of UV protection in sunglasses, as reported by 47% of the participants who do not wear UV-protective sunglasses. Conclusions: The awareness of UV radiation and its harmful effects is high in the studied population. Participant knowledge is also relatively high in relation to nature of solar UV radiation, other synthetic sources of UV radiation, and the most dangerous UV exposure time. However, low participant knowledge was measured on the association between UV radiation with ocular disease and the role of UV-protective eyeglasses. Participant practice toward UV radiation protection was found to be insufficient. Thus, it is important to further increase the knowledge of damaging effects of solar and synthetic UV radiation and emphasize the benefits of eye protection from UV radiation. Eye care practitioners should target youth by different strategies including health campaigns, media, and clinics.
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spelling pubmed-97782452022-12-23 Awareness and Knowledge of the Effect of Ultraviolet (UV) Radiation on the Eyes and the Relevant Protective Practices: A Cross-Sectional Study from Jordan Alebrahim, Mohammad A. Bakkar, May M. Al Darayseh, Abdulla Msameh, Aya Jarrar, Dana Aljabari, Saja Khater, Walla Healthcare (Basel) Article Background: Overexposure to ultraviolet (UV) radiation is linked to serious adverse health effects that are cumulative in nature and affect children more than adults. UV radiation has also been reported to have serious complications for the eye, particularly in areas with a high UV radiation index. Increasing public awareness about the harmful effects of UV radiation on the eye and promoting awareness about protection against UV radiation may prevent eye disease related to UV radiation damage and help in the improvement of public health in general. This study aims to assess public awareness and knowledge of UV radiation and practices toward UV protection in Jordan, which is a country recognized as having a relatively high UV index throughout the year. Methods: A cross-sectional study was performed using an online questionnaire using Google Forms(®) to assess people’s awareness, knowledge, practices toward eye protection from UV radiation, and the reasons for not wearing UV-protective eyeglasses in Jordan. Sociodemographic information of participants including age, gender, education level, and employment status was also acquired. People’s knowledge on UV protection and harmfulness was measured via rewarding their correctly answered knowledge questions with one mark and zero for incorrectly answered questions based on key answers defined from the literature. Results: A total of 1331 participants (77% females and 23% males) with an average age of 26(±10) years completed the online questionnaire. Participants showed generally high levels of knowledge and awareness about UV radiation and its harmful effects. Nevertheless, participants showed a low level of knowledge about the link between UV radiation and some of the ocular diseases in the questionnaire. Practices toward UV radiation protection where inadequate, with 59% of the respondents reporting that they do not use any protective eyewear from natural UV radiation. The main reported reason for not wearing UV-protective sunglasses was uncertainty in the efficiency of UV protection in sunglasses, as reported by 47% of the participants who do not wear UV-protective sunglasses. Conclusions: The awareness of UV radiation and its harmful effects is high in the studied population. Participant knowledge is also relatively high in relation to nature of solar UV radiation, other synthetic sources of UV radiation, and the most dangerous UV exposure time. However, low participant knowledge was measured on the association between UV radiation with ocular disease and the role of UV-protective eyeglasses. Participant practice toward UV radiation protection was found to be insufficient. Thus, it is important to further increase the knowledge of damaging effects of solar and synthetic UV radiation and emphasize the benefits of eye protection from UV radiation. Eye care practitioners should target youth by different strategies including health campaigns, media, and clinics. MDPI 2022-11-30 /pmc/articles/PMC9778245/ /pubmed/36553938 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/healthcare10122414 Text en © 2022 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Alebrahim, Mohammad A.
Bakkar, May M.
Al Darayseh, Abdulla
Msameh, Aya
Jarrar, Dana
Aljabari, Saja
Khater, Walla
Awareness and Knowledge of the Effect of Ultraviolet (UV) Radiation on the Eyes and the Relevant Protective Practices: A Cross-Sectional Study from Jordan
title Awareness and Knowledge of the Effect of Ultraviolet (UV) Radiation on the Eyes and the Relevant Protective Practices: A Cross-Sectional Study from Jordan
title_full Awareness and Knowledge of the Effect of Ultraviolet (UV) Radiation on the Eyes and the Relevant Protective Practices: A Cross-Sectional Study from Jordan
title_fullStr Awareness and Knowledge of the Effect of Ultraviolet (UV) Radiation on the Eyes and the Relevant Protective Practices: A Cross-Sectional Study from Jordan
title_full_unstemmed Awareness and Knowledge of the Effect of Ultraviolet (UV) Radiation on the Eyes and the Relevant Protective Practices: A Cross-Sectional Study from Jordan
title_short Awareness and Knowledge of the Effect of Ultraviolet (UV) Radiation on the Eyes and the Relevant Protective Practices: A Cross-Sectional Study from Jordan
title_sort awareness and knowledge of the effect of ultraviolet (uv) radiation on the eyes and the relevant protective practices: a cross-sectional study from jordan
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9778245/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36553938
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/healthcare10122414
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