Assessment of the Knowledge of Senior Secondary School Students Regarding Cancer, Its Warning Signs and Treatment Modalities Among Selected Schools of District Faridkot, Punjab in a View to Develop Self-Instructional Module Regarding Prevention of Cancer

Abstract

Cancer is an enormous global health burden, touching every region and socioeconomic level. Today, cancer accounts for one in every eight deaths worldwide more than HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria combined. The aim of this study is to assess the knowledge of senior secondary school students regarding cancer, its warning signs and treatment modalities in the selected senior secondary schools Faridkot district. A descriptive, cross-sectional, study was conducted on students of Senior Secondary Schools in District Faridkot, Punjab. Sample was 240 students of senior secondary schools. Convenient sampling technique was used to select 120 students from two government schools and 120 students from two private schools. 60 senior secondary school students, 30 students from 10+1 (15 from arts and 15 from science) and 30 students from 10+2 (15 from arts and 15 from science) were taken from each govt. and private school. Self-structured questionnaire related to assessment of knowledge of senior secondary school students regarding cancer, its warning signs and treatment modalities were used for data collection. The findings of the study revealed that (89.6%) students had adequate knowledge and (10.4%) students had inadequate knowledge regarding cancer, its warning signs and treatment modalities. The mean score of students was 22.46. In sub-content areas, (83.30%) study subjects had adequate knowledge regarding cancer, 75% of students had adequate knowledge regarding its warning signs and 97.5% of students had adequate knowledge regarding treatment modalities. 84.2% students of govt. school had adequate knowledge and 95% students of private school had adequate knowledge. Mean score of govt. school was 21.81 and 23.12 of private school. The t-test value was -2.773 and p-value was 0.000. It is significant at p<0.05. So there was significant difference between the knowledge of government and private senior secondary school students. The private school had more knowledge than govt. school. Chi square test was computed to find the relationship of knowledge of senior secondary school regarding cancer, its warning signs and treatment modalities with selected variables i.e. gender, age, school, class, stream, religion, place of living, types of family, education status of father, education status of mother, occupation of father and mother, family income, heard about cancer and sources of knowledge of cancer. The knowledge about cancer, its warning signs and treatment modalities was found to be significant at p value 0.05 with the religion, education of father, family income and type of school. The knowledge of private school students was found significantly higher than government school students.


Keywords: cancer, knowledge, senior secondary school students, warning signs and treatment modalities