ARTICLE –
abstractKnowledge
and attitude of medical students towards sports medicine Akinsola O.J.1 Owoeye O.B.A.2 1Department
of Community Health and Primary Care, Faculty of Clinical
Sciences, College of Medicine, University of Lagos, Nigeria 2Department of Physiotherapy, Faculty of Clinical Sciences, College of Medicine, University of Lagos, Nigeria
Abstract
Background.
Sport is a large part of the Nigerian culture. A huge proportion of her
people are involved either as a form of relaxation or as employment.
Individuals involved in sports require special care that enfolds
education on injury prevention, treatment of sport-related injuries and
rehabilitation of patients with sport-related injuries. The management
of such patients should therefore be of significant importance to
healthcare providers. Methodology. This was a descriptive
cross-sectional study. Stratified random sampling method was used and
data collection was done using pre-tested, self-administered
questionnaires which were analyzed using Statistical Packages for
Social Sciences (SPSS) version 15.0. Results. The College
of Medicine of the University of Lagos (CMUL), Nigeria, was the area of
study in this research. Two hundred and forty-five (245) medical
students took part in this study. The response rate was 89%. Mean age
was 21±2.8 years. Over half (50.6%) of the respondents were females.
Most of the respondents were single (99.2%), Christian (80.7%) and of
the Yoruba ethnic group (72.3%). It was found in the overall knowledge
score that most of the respondents (63.7%) had good knowledge of sports
medicine. A large proportion of the respondents (79.2%) were aware of
sports medicine having school (52.8%) as their main source of
information. The factors found to influence the overall knowledge of
respondents were curriculum (p=0.000) and level (p=0.000). Overall,
almost all the respondents (99.2%) had a positive attitude towards
sports medicine. Majority (95.0%) of the respondents felt training in
sports medicine is essential however; about half of them (46.7%) felt
that medical students are not adequately trained in sports medicine. Conclusion.
Majority of the medical students of the College of Medicine, University
of Lagos (CMUL) are aware of sports medicine and have a positive
attitude towards it. They would only need to build on this knowledge
and attitude to be adequately skilled to manage patients involved in
sports and physical activity. It is recommended that sports medicine be
incorporated into the medical curriculum of the CMUL as this would
boost the level of knowledge and encourage specialization in sports
medicine among medical students.
Key
words:students, questionnaire, physical activity, medicine
Full
article:
Knowledge and attitude of medical students towards sports medicine
|