Family Physicians’ Knowledge, Attitude, and Practice in Pediatric Vaccination in Tehran Comprehensive Health Services Centers Affiliated to Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences in the year 2018

Abstract

Background and Aim: Pediatric vaccination plays a decisive role in reducing morbidity and mortality caused by some infectious diseases. Therefore, family physicians' knowledge, attitude, and practice are critical factors to be considered in this context.

Methods: This descriptive study included 160 family physicians working in comprehensive urban and rural health service centers (n=100 and n=60, respectively). All the physicians who met inclusion criteria (141 women and 19 men) were chosen through the complete enumeration method. Participants completed questionnaires to assess their knowledge, attitude, and practice. Data were analyzed using Chi-Square tests in IBM software-SPSS Statistic version 20.

Results: The mean age of all physicians was 43.4, and their clinical practice experience was 16.1 years on average. Of all physicians, 21.4% had higher knowledge, 40.7% had more positive attitudes, and 12.9% were more effective in clinical practice. The relationship between gender with knowledge, attitude, and practice was statistically significant. However, no statistically significant relationship was found between the place of servicing and the study's main variables. By contrast, a significant relationship was found between the age of participants and the practice scores, and between years of clinical practice with knowledge (p=0.004) and practice (p=0.010). Moreover, the relationship between studying national guidelines on vaccination with knowledge and attitude was statistically significant.

Conclusions: High-quality education and increasing the quantity of schooling are key prerequisites for upgrading the knowledge of family physicians in pediatric vaccination. Similarly, attitude promotion entails additional and efficient national and international information on children's vaccination programs. Furthermore, revising educational courses and conducting more monitoring and supervising programs by efficient punitive and incentive instruments are essential for improving the practice of physicians. And ultimately, multicenter trials with larger sample sizes are recommended for future studies.