A Questionnaire based Survey on the Knowledge, Attitude and Practises about Antimicrobial Resistance and Usage among the Second year MBBS Students of a Teaching tertiary care Hospital in Central India

Abstract

Context: Antibiotic resistance (ABR) is an important growing global health issue which needs urgent addressal. Judicious use of antibiotics is the only solution to curb this problem. Awareness of this fact among UG students, who are the future physicians is extremely vital. Aims: To assess the knowledge, attitude and practices (KAP) related to antibiotic resistance and usage in UG students. Settings and Design: cross sectional, questionnaire based survey. Methods and Material: The questionnaire was distributed to a batch of 86 medical students in their second year of MBBS, whereby their KAP regarding antibiotic use and resistance was assessed by a five point Likert scale, whose responses ranged from „strongly agree‟ to „strongly disagree,‟ and „always‟ to „never. Some questions were of true and false type. Statistical analysis: The data was analyzed by using simple descriptive statistics to generate frequencies, percentages and proportions. Wherever it was relevant, the Chi-square test was used to determine any significant difference. Results: Indiscriminate antimicrobial use leads to the emergence of the growing problem of resistance was known to all n=86(100%) of the participants. The number of respondents who agreed that ABR was an important and a serious global public health issue was 83(96.51%).Ninety four per cent (n = 81) of the respondents were aware that bacteria were not responsible for causing colds and flu. Conclusions: Our study provides an important insight regarding the knowledge, attitudes and practices regarding antibiotic resistance and usage among the future doctors, which can be considered, in order to plan for an effective undergraduate curriculum.