Increasing public awareness about hepatitis C: development and validation of the brief hepatitis C knowledge scale

Abstract

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is silently becoming a major public health problem. Currently, no validated HCV knowledge measures exist. This study aimed to develop and validate a brief measure to assess general knowledge about HCV risk factors, modes of transmissions, and treatment options. A total of 406 individuals participated in this cross-sectional study. All participants completed the proposed 19-item Brief HCV Knowledge Scale. Participants were: HCV mono-infected patients (n = 83), HCV-human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) co-infected patients (n = 24), HIV mono-infected patients (n = 128) community healthcare workers (n = 89), and college students (n = 82). Two-week test-retest data were collected for the college student sample. Psychometric evaluation of the proposed scale demonstrated high levels of validity (content and construct validity) and reliability (internal consistency and retest stability). Factor analysis indicated a one-factor solution, which accounted for 49% of the variance. HCV knowledge was positively correlated with length of time since HCV diagnosis (r = 0.29, p < 0.05). HCV treatment-experienced patients obtained significantly higher HCV knowledge scores (82% correct) than HCV treatment-naïve patients (72% correct) (p < 0.05). HCV knowledge in College students (43% correct) and HIV patients (54% correct) was significantly lower than in HCV patients (77% correct) and community healthcare workers (80% correct) (p < 0.001). Community workers' HCV knowledge was positively correlated with years of HCV work experience (r = 0.30, p < 0.01). This self-administered Brief HCV Knowledge scale has high levels of validity and reliability across patient, healthcare provider and college student populations. It has valuable applications as a clinical teaching tool with patients and healthcare providers and could be used as an outcome indicator in novel HCV educational intervention studies.

Impact of Hepatitis on Agriculture Productivity and Awareness About Disease in Rural Areas

“…Only 7% percent respondents had complete knowledge about hepatitis disease. This lack of knowledge could be the main reason of rapid increase in hepatitis disease in Pakistan as stated by Balfour (2009) and Ali et al (2015). The results of Table 2 show that female respondents had more knowledge than the male respondents.…”

“…In a developing country like Pakistan, people have no knowledge about causes of hepatitis (B and C) due to high illiteracy rate (Balfour, 2009). Table 1 explains that majority of the respondents had no knowledge about hepatitis disease.…”

Knowledge of Viral Hepatitis among MSM in a Sub-Saharan African City: A Cross-Sectional Study in Calabar, Nigeria

“…Questionnaire consisted of sociodemographic characteristics (including type of MSM), awareness of hepatitis B and C, and 20-item questions assessing knowledge of the meaning (1), basic prevalence (1), means of transmission (4), basic symptoms and signs (4), fatality (2), and means of prevention of the infections (8). Questionnaire was adapted from validated tools for the assessment of knowledge of sexually transmitted infections, as well as from previous surveys [12][13][14].…”

“…A little below half of the subjects (33, 47.8%) had inadequate knowledge of hepatitis, consisting of poor (21,30.4%) and fair (12,17.4%) knowledge (Table 2). Table 3).…”

An uncontrolled, feasibility study of a group intervention to reduce hepatitis C transmission risk behaviours and increase transmission knowledge among women who inject drugs

“…The HCV transmission knowledge questionnaire used in this study (REDUCE, 2013) was adapted from Balfour et al (Balfour et al, 2009) and updated to include (Tohme & Holmberg, 2010). The questionnaire used in the current study had 53 risk statements with three response options "true", "false" and "don't know".…”