ارزشیابی تأثیر آموزش بهداشت بر آگاهی و نگرش دانش‌آموزان دبیرستان‌های دخترانه شهر بیرجند در مورد بیماری ایدز (سال 1386)

  Background and Aim: Regarding the decisive role of the youth in spreading the risk of infecting with AIDS, the only means of controlling the disease is education and increasing knowledge. ‏ Thus, the present study was planned with the aim of assessing the effect of an educational program on knowledge and attitude of high school female students regarding AIDS in Birjand.   Materials and Methods: This pre-post quasi-experimental study was done on 295 high school female students in Birjand. The method used was multiple-stage randomized sampling. A self-designed questionnaire on the basis of the goals of the study, whose content reliability had been approved by a number of efficient academic members was used. The mentioned questionnaires were filled out before educational intervention, and one month later. The obtained data was analyze by SPSS software at the significant level of α=0.05.   Results: The students' mean knowledge grade increased from 30.2±8.2 to 36.8±6.4 (P<0.001) and their mean attitude grade from 53.1±6.5 to 57.2±6.8 (P<0.001) after education. Before intervention 20% of the students had weak knowledge, 42% had average knowledge, and 38% of them had good knowledge but after intervention these percentages changed to 3.4% (weak), 22.4% (average), and 74.2% (good) respectively. Before intervention 1.4% of the students had weak attitude, 85.8% average attitude, and only 12.8% had good attitude. These percentages changed to 0.7%, 65.1%, and 34.2% after intervention respectively.   Conclusion: Since the effect of education on the promotion of students’ knowledge and attitude has been approved, implementing health education programs in schools must be taken into consideration as an educational priority on the part of health and education authorities throughout the country.