This paper is in the following e-collection/theme issue:

EMPHNET 6th Regional Conference 2018: "Innovative approaches: Adapting to the current EMR context" (111)
Infectious Diseases Surveillance and Notification in Jordan: Physicians' Knowledge, Attitude and Practice

Infectious Diseases Surveillance and Notification in Jordan: Physicians' Knowledge, Attitude and Practice

Infectious Diseases Surveillance and Notification in Jordan: Physicians' Knowledge, Attitude and Practice

Authors of this article:

Nansi Abdulrahim ;   I Alasasfeh ;   A Abusalieh ;   I Ablan ;   Y Khader
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    Abstract

    Corresponding Author:

    Nansi Abdulrahim


    Background: Public health surveillance provides crucial information for monitoring the health of the public, identifying public health problems, and triggering action to prevent further illness. Health professionals' knowledge and awareness of the disease surveillance is essential for effective reporting diseases to health departments.

    Objective: This study aimed to identify the knowledge and attitudes of Jordanian physicians towards public health surveillance.

    Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted among resident doctors who were working in four main ministry of health (MOH) hospitals and two teaching hospitals in Jordan in September 2017. Residents from all specialties were visited by the researcher and invited to participate in this study. A self-administered paper-based questionnaire was used to collect the data. The questionnaire collected information about socio-demographic and practice-related characteristics of physicians and included items to assess their knowledge of surveillance and reporting practices.

    Results: This study included 223 physicians (152 males and 71 females). About 60.1% of the residents were graduates from medical schools in Jordan and the remaining (39.9%) were graduates from medical schools in other countries. Approximately two thirds of residents (62.3%) were doing their residency in MOH hospitals and the rest (37.7%) in two teaching hospitals. Only 44.8% of physicians had defined surveillance correctly. About 53.8% identified population surveys and case reporting as a source of public health surveillance data. Only 27.4% of physicians had been educated or trained on surveillance. About 39.5% of physicians had filled at least one report form during their practice. The main reasons for not reporting mandatory diseases were high workload (49.8%) and being not trained on reporting diseases (46.6%).

    Conclusions: A relatively high percentage of physicians have insufficient knowledge of surveillance and reporting of notifiable infectious diseases. Training of physicians on surveillance and diseases notification is highly needed. The practice of disease notification should be enforced in Jordanian hospitals.

    iproc 2018;4(1):e10544

    doi:10.2196/10544


    Edited by Y Khader; This is a non–peer-reviewed article. submitted 29.03.18; accepted 29.03.18; published 29.03.18

    Copyright

    ©Nansi Abdulrahim, I Alasasfeh, A Abusalieh, I Ablan, Y Khader. Originally published in Iproceedings (http://www.iproc.org), 29.03.2018.

    This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work, first published in Iproceedings, is properly cited. The complete bibliographic information, a link to the original publication on http://www.iproc.org/, as well as this copyright and license information must be included.