Familiarity with and attitudes towards epilepsy among teachers at Czech elementary schools—The effect of personal experience and subspecialization

Abstract

This study was intended to study the effect of personal experience and subspecialization on the knowledge of epilepsy of teachers at Czech elementary schools, and on their attitudes towards children with epilepsy and on epilepsy itself in general. 193 teachers from 10 different elementary schools in Pilsen, Czech Republic, were involved in the study. We found that teachers with personal experience of epilepsy had greater knowledge of the illness. There were significant differences (P<0.05) between the attitudes of teachers with and without personal experience, mostly in terms of their views on the self-realization and the integration of children with epilepsy into the school collective. In contrast, no differences were found in their views of the intellectual capabilities of children with epilepsy or the overall quality of life of children with epilepsy. Furthermore, we found that subspecialization, aside from a few exceptions given by the specific position of first grade teachers, did not have major effect on teachers' knowledge of epilepsy and their attitudes towards children with epilepsy. The results suggest that it would be appropriate to focus educational interventions about epilepsy for teachers on those individuals who do not have any experience of epilepsy.

Educational Program for School Health Nurses and Teachers Regarding Primary School Children with Epilepsy

“…As for the studied teachers' characteristics, results revealed that, slightly more than two fifths of them aged from 30 to less than 40 years; less than two third are female; near percentages representing, less than half have university bachelor education, and have 7 years of experience or more. These results agree with [13], whose study entitled: "Familiarity with and attitudes towards epilepsy among teachers at Czech elementary schools the effect of personal experience and sub-specialization in Pilsen, Czech Republic" reported that more than two third of studied teachers are female. This finding also is in accordance with that of [14] studied the "Effect of health educational program on knowledge about epilepsy and its management among primary schools' teachers in Port Said City", found that the female percentage of teachers exceeded that of the males.…”

An educational campaign toward epilepsy among Italian primary school teachers

“…School teachers with correct knowledge of and appropriate attitudes toward epilepsy could put the social reflections of epilepsy in a correct perspective, thus contributing to the reduction of stigma. Public knowledge and attitudes toward epilepsy have been investigated in several countries and have been found to be mostly inadequate [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15]. Time spent in teaching and experience with students with epilepsy predict better knowledge of the disease [7,10,16].…”

Specifics of Children With Epilepsy in School Environment

“…It was reported that more experienced teachers [28] and/ or the teachers who received pre-service or in-service epilepsy training [29] have more favorable attitudes and greater epilepsy-related knowledge. Our recent study shows that teachers having a personal experience with epilepsy exhibit a significantly higher level of knowledge and more positive attitudes towards people with epilepsy compared with teachers not having this experience [30] . Furthermore, we found that subspecialization of the teachers does not have a major effect on these variables [30] .…”

“…Our recent study shows that teachers having a personal experience with epilepsy exhibit a significantly higher level of knowledge and more positive attitudes towards people with epilepsy compared with teachers not having this experience [30] . Furthermore, we found that subspecialization of the teachers does not have a major effect on these variables [30] .…”