Medical students' knowledge and attitudes in relation to COVID-19 pandemic in Saudi Arabia

Abstract

Background: Medical students have an important role to provide training to other medical students and health workers, and to volunteer when there is a shortage in health care personnel. The aim of the study was to evaluate the knowledge of medical students in six medical colleges in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, about the coronavirus-19 (COVID-19) pandemic. Materials and Methods: An online survey was distributed to undergraduate medical students from August to October 2021. A total of 261 medical students participated in the study. The survey composed of 26 questions that evaluated students' knowledge about the COVID-19 pandemic in terms of symptoms, modes of transmission, diagnosis, management, and prevention. Results: Two hundred and sixty-one medical students participated in the study with an overall response rate of 31.37%. Around half of the respondents (54%) being from 1st to 4rd medical years 81 (31.03%) and 60 (22.99%), respectively. The students' knowledge regarding COVID-19 was investigated in different domains. The mean knowledge score of the protection and prevention of the disease was the highest with a (mean = 79.85%) followed by the knowledge of the ways of the disease transmission (mean 71.31%). 140 (53.64%) of the participants knew how to properly diagnose COVID-19, while (48.35%) were able to identify the different possible symptoms that can be seen in COVID-19-positive individuals (47.32%) knew the different lines of treatment according to the case severity. Conclusions: The results of the present study can be utilized to develop undergraduate medical curricula with the sufficient amount of knowledge about the COVID-19 pandemic.