An Overview of Attitude, Behavior, and Knowledge Level Toward COVID-19 Among Patients Visiting the Otolaryngology Clinic after 1 Year of COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Introduction: In December 2019, a new variant of coronavirus was identified in Wuhan city, China. It was named Severe acute respiratory syndrome-Coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), and the disease it caused was defined as Coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19). The attitude of people and their knowledge level play an important role in coping with pandemics. Determining the level of public knowledge is also critical for identifying gaps in disease protection and strengthening disease prevention efforts. The present study aimed to describe the general knowledge regarding COVID-19 and the attitude toward the disease among patients applying to an otolaryngology clinic approximately one year after the COVID-19 pandemic. Materials and Methods: We prepared a questionnaire comprising two sections with a total of 19 items. The first section had questions regarding demographic data including age, sex, education level, and job, and the second section had questions assessing knowledge and attitude toward COVID-19. Each correct answer was assigned 1 point;incorrect answers or unknown answers were assigned 0 points. A participant could receive a total knowledge score of 0-19;higher scores indicate better knowledge of COVID-19. Results: A total of 404 participants were included in our study. The median knowledge score among all participants was 15.0±3.0. There was a statistically significant difference between primary school and university graduates (p<0.05) and between secondary school and university graduates in terms of knowledge scores (p=0.012). Similar to the primary and secondary school graduates, high school and university graduates differed significantly in terms of knowledge level (p=0.0001). Conclusion: The mean rate of correct answers among patients regarding knowledge and perception questions on COVID-19 was 77.67%. Our results demonstrated that the sample we selected from the patients visiting our otolaryngology clinic had a high COVID-19 knowledge score. The average knowledge score was possibly high in our study owing to the fact that the participants were mostly university graduates (52.5%).