Effects of Health Education Based Intervention on Community’s Perception, Healthy House, and Social Capital of Dengue in Endemic Area of Sleman Regency Indonesia

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Low community participation in the dengue hemorrhagic fever (DHF) control efforts is one of the influencing factors in the failures of some of these efforts. The community’s lack of responsibility concerning the DHF issues might be caused by their low perceptions and understanding of DHF itself. AIM: This study aimed to assess the effect of health education about DHF on changes in the community’s perceptions, social capital, and healthy house conditions. METHODS: The research method was participatory action research. The study involved 267 households in Patukan Hamlet Sleman Yogyakarta Indonesia. The intervention was health education about DHF which was presented from November 2018 to February 2019. Preliminary assessments were taken in November 2018 and evaluations were taken in August 2019. The data were analyzed with the Wilcoxon test. RESULTS: The results show that in the 6th months after the intervention, there was an increase in the average score of all variables. The differences between pre- and post-intervention were statistically significant: Perceptions of dengue fever (p = 0.000); perceptions about DHF control (p = 0.000); the social condition for the component of concern, trust, and readiness to learn new ideas with p < 0.05; and all component of healthy house conditions with p < 0.05. CONCLUSION: Health education could contribute to changes in perceptions, social capital, and a healthy house condition. It is very important to increase the awareness and participation of the community in controlling DHF.