Knowledge and Attitudes of Maintaining Bone Health among Post-Menopausal Women in Malaysia.

Nik Noor Kaussar Nik Mohd Hatta,Mohd Said Nurumal,Azlina Daud,Muhammad Ibrahim,Mohd Ariff Sharifudin,Samsul Deraman,Muhammad Lokman Muhammad Isa

doi:10.5195/cajgh.2019.348

Nik Noor Kaussar Nik Mohd Hatta, Mohd Said Nurumal + Show 5 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.5195/cajgh.2019.348

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Abstract

Public awareness of osteoporosis is low among women in the developing countries. Health education was shown to be effective in improving knowledge and awareness on maintaining bone health. This study aims to identify the level of knowledge and attitudes among post-menopausal women in Malaysia on achieving bone health throughout the menopausal transition period. A total of 116 post-menopausal female patients of orthopedic menopause clinic were recruited using a purposive sampling approach. Data on osteoporosis awareness and knowledge were collected using validated structured questionnaires Osteoporosis Prevention and Awareness Tool and Osteoporosis Attitude Knowledge Test. The chi-square test was used to determine the association between post-menopausal women's socio-demographic characteristics and their knowledge and attitude towards maintaining bone health. Participants' age ranged between 49 and 82 years (61.84, SD=7.87). The knowledge of osteoporosis varied significantly by age (p=0.014) and education (p=0.001) among the studied population. No significant diffrences were found for participants' attitude towards bone health. This study showed that the age and education levels have significantly different knowledge of bone health.

Highlights

Public awareness of osteoporosis is low among women in the developing countries
This study demonstrated that knowledge on bone health significantly varied based on the age group
The respondents believed that they had adequate knowledge on bone health, while in actuality they did not

Summary

Introduction

Public awareness of osteoporosis is low among women in the developing countries. Health education was shown to be effective in improving knowledge and awareness on maintaining bone health. This study aims to identify the level of knowledge and attitudes among post-menopausal women in Malaysia on achieving bone health throughout the menopausal transition period. Conclusion: This study showed that the age and education levels have significantly different knowledge of bone health. One study showed that 28.4% of Malaysian women are osteoporotic.[1] Another study found that 42.1% of postmenopausal and 11.1% of premenopausal women in Malaysia were osteoporotic (p < 0.005).[2] Decline in Bone Mineral Density (BMD) among women accelerates after menopause.[3] Suppression of estrogen production results in significant increases in bone resorption markers and suppression of bone formation markers.[4] Post-menopausal women are at high risk of osteoporosis and constitute a majority of fragility fracture hospital admissions. Women tend to have insufficient calcium intake on daily basis, as average calcium intake (426 mg/day) is

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