Assessment of Knowledge Regarding Rubella Infection amongst the Medical Students in a Government Medical College of Southern Rajasthan
Author(s): Poornima Sharma, Keerti and Hariom Sharma
Abstract
Rubella (German measles) is a mild viral disease characterized by mild fever and rashes and is contagious by sneezing and coughing. Though it commonly affects the children but if it infects a pregnant woman, it leads to serious birth defects known as Congenital Rubella Syndrome. According to WHO, before the introduction of the vaccine, up to 4 babies in every 1000 live births were born with CRS. Thus a timely vaccination is highly important to prevent the disease. To assess the knowledge of medical students regarding Rubella infection in a Government medical college of Udaipur and to assess the felt need regarding the vaccination of Rubella in these medical students. A Cross sectional hospital based survey was done on 120 students in the Dept of PSM, MB Hospital, RNT Medical College, Udaipur from 1st dec to 31st dec 2016 using a self-made, pre designed questionnaire pretested by the faculty members of the department. 60 students were randomly selected from prefinal and intern batches during their rotatory posting in the Community Medicine department. 100% students had heard of Rubella disease and knew that it is a viral infection. But 3.33% students had not heard of Congenital Rubella Syndrome. Half of them were intern males and half were prefinal females. 46.6% students correctly answered the First trimester of the pregnancy as the most common to be affected. 41.6% students were unaware about their vaccination status against MMR while 10% were totally unimmunized. The most common attributions pointed were like unavailability of vaccine, unawareness about the need or availability etc. Though the prevalence of Rubella and CRS seems quite high in our country, the medical students still lack the adequate knowledge regarding the infection and vaccination. Moreover their practice was also not appropriate as 42% students were not aware of their vaccination status and 10% students accepted that they were not vaccinated that too because of the unavailability of the vaccine. Unfortunately 23% denied to get vaccinated in future. Thus efforts should be made to make them aware of this health problem.
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