Thalassemia and premarital screening: potential for implementation of a screening program among young people in Pakistan
Document Type
Article
Department
Community Health Sciences
Abstract
Pakistan has a high prevalence of β-thalassemia (β-thal) but lacks a screening program for its prevention. This questionnaire-based cross-sectional study was conducted in six randomly chosen non medical universities to assess the students' knowledge of β-thal and premarital screening, and their attitude towards such a program. Comparison was made between the respondents' attitude towards premarital screening before and after providing them some information regarding the disease. Only 54.5% (207) of 380 students had heard of β-thal, with a mean knowledge score of 13.0 ± 4.4 out of 27 questions. Most respondents were aware of the concept of premarital screening. Out of 207 students, 60.4% wanted to know if they were carriers, 69.1% wanted to know their spouse's carrier status and 59.4% wanted premarital screening to be made mandatory in Pakistan. These figures increased to 72.5, 78.3 and 67.6%, respectively after provision of written information (p values: 0.03, 0.02, and 0.01, respectively). The positive attitude towards premarital screening with low background knowledge of the disease highlights the need of a mass awareness campaign and subsequent implementation of a premarital screening program.
Publication (Name of Journal)
Hemoglobin
Recommended Citation
Mirza, A.,
Ghani, A.,
Pal, A.,
Sami, A.,
Hannan, S.,
Ashraf, Z.,
Iqbal, S.,
Malik, U. Z.,
Hayat, U.,
Fatmi, Z.
(2013). Thalassemia and premarital screening: potential for implementation of a screening program among young people in Pakistan. Hemoglobin, 37(2), 160-170.
Available at:
https://ecommons.aku.edu/pakistan_fhs_mc_chs_chs/142