Enhancing Knowledge in Informal Settlements: Assessing Health Beliefs and Behaviors in Nigeria

Abstract

Background: Community Health Education (CHE) programs have been shown to be effective in relieving the burden on healthcare systems in Sub-Saharan Africa. Objective: This project aimed to determine the baseline level of health literacy, behavioral practices, and accessibility to resources in a set of 16 informal settlements located around Lagos, Nigeria in order to identify topics that should be emphasized in a new teaching curriculum directed at local Community Health Educators. Methods: In June of 2017, a unique cross-sectional survey composed of 37 questions was conducted in informal settlements around Lagos. Sites selected were areas in which future CHE trainings were planned to take place and survey participants were chosen by trained community health educators based on convenience sampling with snowball effect. Survey questions included both multiple-choice and open-ended questions and were asked in the local language. We collected demographic information and assessed health literacy, health behaviors, and community practices. Results were analyzed using descriptive statistics to assess for differences between demographic groups. Findings: Our survey collected 348 total responses. Respondents displayed a high level of knowledge regarding the benefits of hand washing (97.1%) and childhood immunizations (81.0%). Knowledge around infectious diseases and reproductive health was lower, including a large proportion of people (50%) incorrectly indicating that HIV could be spread through a mosquito bite. Malaria was reported to be the most prevalent disease affecting both adults (40.0%) and children (58.3%). Health access was limited, with most people not reporting access to a nearby health center (55.8%). Conclusions: Areas of knowledge that should be emphasized in future versions of CHE training curricula include infectious diseases, reproductive health, and reinforcement of the importance of sanitation and clean water. The curriculum should address the reality of limited health access and develop strategies to improve this.

The Health Behaviour of German Outpatient Caregivers in Relation to the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Mixed-Methods Study

“…Several studies have already been published analysing caregivers' job demands during the COVID-19 pandemic and their strain reactions, e.g., [17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35]. However, these studies do not include the health behaviour of caregivers at all.…”

Community knowledge and the role of libraries and librarians in the current digital age

“…The technology acceptance theory identifies the linkages between an individual user's attitude and perception and adoption of technology. Liu et al (2020aLiu et al ( , 2020b noted that the technology acceptance model emphasises perceptions on how useful and how easy to use technology actually is. The attitudes and perceptions of students towards community knowledge is important for its uptake and use.…”

“…This poses the danger of fake news and unverifiable information. Another challenge of community knowledge is that of users' expectations (Liu et al, 2020a(Liu et al, , 2020b. The users may want to rely fully on the information that is shared through community knowledge.…”