AB1522 THE ASSESSMENT OF KNOWLEDGE OF NURSES BEFORE AND AFTER TRAINING ABOUT SPONDYLOARTHRITIS AND RHEUMATOID ARTHRITIS

Abstract

BackgroundNurses’ education programs play an important role in the management of chronic diseases in rheumatology clinics. They can assume their own patient case-loads and provide an educative role to promote health.ObjectivesIn order to foster educational programs, the present study aimed to assess the level of knowledge of nurses before and after targeted training sessions.MethodsThe nurses of the rheumatology department of Mongi Slim Hospital have been included initially during the month of September 2021, then later, after having followed a training during the month of January 2022.Data were collected by two self-administrated tests. The rheumatoid arthritis knowledge assessment scale (RAKAS) (1) which consisted of 13 items, defined knowledge as awareness about the disease, its risk factors, symptoms and treatment and categorized it into four levels namely, excellent, adequate, low and poor knowledge. The tool had a maximum of 14 points. A nurse was designed to have excellent knowledge if the score was 11 and above, adequately knowledgeable if the score was between 8 and 10, low knowledge if the score was between 5 and 7 and poor knowledge if it was 4 or less. Spondyloarthritis knowledge assessment questionnaire (SPAKE) (2) with 14 questions and 72 possible responses, divided into four areas, (A) general knowledge, comprising etiology, symptoms, blood tests (score range 0-8), (B) immunogenetic test (B27 antigen) and inheritance (score range 0-3), (C) general management, including drug treatment and physical therapy (score range 0-9), (D) joint protection, pacing and priorities (score range 0-5)The Wilcoxon signed rank test was used to assess the difference between test results before and after training. The level of statistical significance was set at p<0.05.ResultsTen nurses were included with a sex ratio (M/F) of 0.3.Initially, the average RAKAS score was 11.7 ± 1.2. Almost two thirds of the nurses had excellent knowledge (n= 7, 70%) and the rest (n= 3, 30%) had adequate knowledge.The average SPAKE score was low (12.9±3.7). For the nurses interviewed in domain A, the maximum score was not reached and the average score was 5±1.6. For domain B, the maximum score was reached only once and the average score was 1.2±0.9. For domain C, the maximum possible score was not reached and the average score was 5.1±2.2. For domain D, the maximum score was not reached and the average score was low at 1.6±0.6.For the post-training test, the average RAKAS score was 12.6±0.5 and all nurses had excellent knowledge (n= 10, 100%).The average SPAKE score has risen (20.1±1.6). For the nurses interviewed in domain A, the maximum score was reached two times and the average score was 6.9±0.8. For domain B, the maximum score was reached four times and the average score was 2±0.9. For domain C, more than half of nurses have reached the maximum score (n=6, 60%) and the average score was 8.4±0.8. For domain D; the maximum score was not reached and the average score was 3.2±0.9.Differences between pre- and post-training test scores were found to be statistically significant for the SPAKE questionnaire (p=0.005) but not for the RAKAS (p=0.077).ConclusionThe nurses’ knowledge of rheumatoid arthritis was initially adequate, but not of spondyloarthritis, which improved significantly through the targeted training sessions.