AN EXPERIMENTAL STUDY TO ASSESS THE EFFECTIVENESS OF WEBINAR ON KNOWLEDGE REGARDING COVID - 19 VACCINE AMONG HEALTH PROFESSIONALS IN SELECTED INSTITUTIONS IN INDIA.

Abstract

The COVID-19 is a global pandemic of caused by coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). Various types of Covid – 19 vaccines are made available by the Government of India; the next challenge could be public having hesitancy to take the vaccine due to inadequate knowledge. Healthcare professionals are frontline workers who work across the various healthcare agencies including hospitals and on community basis. They play an important role during this Covid - 19 pandemic and can help the people and family members to get adequate awareness related to Covid – 19 vaccine and thereby promoting general public to take vaccine. Therefore, the present study was conducted to assess the efficacy of webinar on COVID - 19 vaccine among health care professionals. The objectives of the study were to assess the pretest and post-test knowledge regarding COVID - 19 vaccine among health care professionals, to compare pretest and post-test knowledge score and to associate between pretest knowledge score with selected demographic variables.  The data were collected using online platform from 90 health professional by convenient sampling technique. A Self - structured multiple-choice questionnaire was the tool used in this study, which was having, two-parts i.e., demographic variables and knowledge questionnaire on Covid – 19 vaccines. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyze the data. Results shows that pretest knowledge score as 52 (57.8%) of samples had adequate knowledge, 37 (41.1%) had average knowledge and 1 (1.1%) had inadequate knowledge regarding Covid - 19 vaccine while post-test knowledge score as 81 (90%) of samples had adequate knowledge, and 9 (10%) had average knowledge regarding Covid – 19 vaccines. On comparing the pretest and post-test knowledge score of samples regarding corona vaccine, the mean pretest knowledge score was 10.86 and that of mean post- test knowledge score was 13.25. The calculated ‘t’ value – 11.064 at 89 degree of freedom was significant at 0.05 level, which shows that the knowledge of health professionals

was improved after the webinar regarding Covid - 19 vaccine. There was no statistically significant association between pretest knowledge score of health professionals regarding Covid – 19 vaccines with selected sample characteristics such as designation, gender, age, marital status, district and state. The study concluded that all the categories of health professionals should undergo extensive educational programs regarding Covid – 19 vaccines.