Awareness and knowledge of heterozygous familial hypercholesterolemia among Serbian pediatricians

Ljiljana Bjelakovic; Lazar Stosic; Aleksandra Klisic; Marko Jovic; Sanja Stankovic; Aleksandra Stankovic; Sasa Pantelic; Danijela Zivkovic; Vladimir Vukovic; Bojko Bjelakovic

doi:10.3389/fped.2023.1096478

Awareness and knowledge of heterozygous familial hypercholesterolemia among Serbian pediatricians

Front Pediatr. 2023 Feb 7:11:1096478. doi: 10.3389/fped.2023.1096478. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Medical Science, Faculty of Sport and Physical Education, University of Nis, Nis, Serbia.
² Faculty of Medicine, University of Nis, Nis, Serbia.
³ Primary Health Care Center, University of Montenegro-Faculty of Medicine, Podgorica, Montenegro.
⁴ Faculty of Medicine, Institute of Biochemistry, University of Kragujevac, Kragujevac, Serbia.
⁵ Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Institute of Public Health of Vojvodina, Novi Sad, Serbia.
⁶ Department of Epidemiology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Novi Sad, Novi Sad, Serbia.
⁷ Clinic of Pediatrics, Clinical Center, Nis, Serbia.

Abstract

Objective: Published reports describing awareness and knowledge of familial hypercholesterolemia (FH) among pediatricians are few and differ considerably across countries. We aimed to assess awareness and knowledge of the FH among pediatricians in Serbia.

Methods: A web-based cross-sectional study using a self-designed questionnaire was conducted during the annual congress of the Serbian Association of Preventive Pediatrics in 2020.

Results: A total of 141 pediatricians completed the questionnaire (response rate 16.1%). Overall, 91% of participants have knowledge about genetic inheritance of FH, 84.3% were aware of long-term health risks of FH, 77% were familiar with normal cholesterol values in children and 71% knew the FH prevalence in the general population. On the other hand, only 36.8% declared that they were familiar with international guidelines for FH drug treatment and only 26.2% declared to have patients with FH.

Conclusion: There is a substantial lack of practical clinical knowledge among Serbian pediatricians on managing children with FH. In addition, an extremely low questionnaire response rate (16.1%) suggests that most pediatricians are not aware of the clinical importance of FH in childhood.

Keywords: awareness; electronic questionnaire survey; familial hypercholesterolemia; knowledge; pediatricians; questionnaire.

Grants and funding

This work was supported by grant No. 175092 from the Ministry of Science and Technology of Serbia.