COVID-19: A National Survey on Perceived Level of Knowledge, Attitude and Practice among Frontline Healthcare Workers in Nepal

Abstract

<title>Abstract</title> <bold>Background: </bold>The primary aim of this national survey was to determine the knowledge, attitude and practice(KAP) regarding the COVID-19 among frontline healthcare workers(F-HCWs) working at different hospitals in Nepal, and the secondary aim was to find the factors associated with KAP. <bold>Methods: </bold>We used a web-based survey to collect data from 603 F-HCWs working at different hospitals in Nepal during the first week of June 2020. A self-administered questionnaire was utilized to assess the KAP perceived by the F-HCWs. It was divided into 4-parts consisting of 30-items, demographic characteristics (10-items), knowledge (10-items), attitude (5-items), and practice (5-items). It consisted of both multiple-choice questions and Likert scale items questionnaire. <bold>Results: </bold>Among the participants, 76% reported adequate knowledge, 54.7% reported positive attitude, and 78.9% reported appropriate practice. Statistically significant differences regarding the perceived level of knowledge among F-HCWs were observed among independent variables, including age, gender, level of education, marital status, profession, work experience, source of information, infection prevention and control (IPC) training, and online course(p&lt;0.05). Similarly, statistically significant differences regarding the attitude among F-HCWs were observed among independent variables, including age, gender, level of education, profession, and online course(p&lt;0.05). Moreover, only 2-independent variables, including the profession and online course, showed statistically significant differences with practice(p&lt;0.05). Pearson correlation analysis showed a significant association between knowledge, attitude and practice at the level of p=0.01. The factors significantly associated with adequate knowledge were male gender (aOR: 3.66; 95%CI: 1.97-6.82), nurse and doctor (aOR: 2.10; 95%CI: 1.18-3.72), websites (aOR: 1.83; 95%CI: 1.83 (1.13-2.97) and IPC training (aOR: 1.53; 95%CI: 1.02-2.31). Similarly, factors significantly associated with positive attitude were online course related to COVID-19 (aOR: 1.49; 95%CI: 1.02-2.17) only. Moreover, factors significantly associated with appropriate practice were master’s degree or above (aOR: 0.56; 95%CI: 0.31-1.00) and online course related to COVID-19 (aOR: 2.43; 95%CI: 1.44-4.09) <bold>Conclusions: </bold>F-HCWs reported adequate overall knowledge with a positive attitude and adopted the appropriate practice.The experienced F-HCWs with higher education and who received IPC training and online course regarding COVID-19 had better KAP. So, the stakeholders must arrange the educational programs and training for F-HCWs for better preparedness tackling with COVID-19.