Knowledge and attitude regarding cervical cancer and its prevention among young female adults in Kuantan, Malaysia

Munawara Burhan; Nor Azlina A Rahman; Mainul Haque

doi:10.4103/jehp.jehp_1454_20

Knowledge and attitude regarding cervical cancer and its prevention among young female adults in Kuantan, Malaysia

J Educ Health Promot. 2021 Sep 30:10:332. doi: 10.4103/jehp.jehp_1454_20. eCollection 2021.

Authors

Munawara Burhan¹, Nor Azlina A Rahman², Mainul Haque³

Affiliations

¹ Department of Biomedical Science, Kulliyyah of Allied Health Sciences, International Islamic University Malaysia, Pahang, Malaysia.
² Department of Physical Rehabilitation Sciences, Kulliyyah of Allied Health Sciences, International Islamic University Malaysia, Pahang, Malaysia.
³ Unit of Pharmacology, Faculty of Medicine and Defence Health, National Defence University of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Abstract

Background: Cervical cancer is the second-most common female cancer in Malaysia after breast cancer. This study intended to investigate the knowledge and attitude regarding cervical cancer and its prevention and its associated factors among young female adults in Kuantan, Malaysia, to gauge the community's understanding and idea about this issue.

Materials and methods: The study was conducted in attractive places in Kuantan, Malaysia, such as shopping malls and Urban Transformation Centre, using a cross-sectional study design and convenience sampling method. Data on the respondents' knowledge and attitude regarding cervical cancer and its prevention were collected using a questionnaire. Kruskal-Wallis, Independent t-, and Pearson correlation tests were used to investigate the study variables' association using SPSS software.

Results: From the total of 142 respondents, almost half of them aged between 20 and 24 years old with the majority were Malays (85.9%) and single (74.6%). The internet (78.1%) was identified as the main medium to gain information regarding cervical cancer. The results show that levels of education, races, and occupation types were statistically significantly associated with the respondents' knowledge and attitude scores in this study. Age was found to be associated with knowledge scores only, while marital status was only significantly associated with the attitude scores regarding cervical cancer and its prevention. Knowledge scores were also found to be positively associated with attitude scores.

Conclusion: Several socio-demographic factors were significantly associated with the knowledge and attitude regarding cervical cancer and its prevention. In view of the positive association between knowledge and attitude scores, suitable health promotion activities can be designed and planned to increase young female adults' knowledge and attitudes toward cervical cancer and its prevention.

Keywords: Attitude; Malaysia; cervical cancer; knowledge; young female adults.