Abstract :
Vitamin D deficiency is a global health concern and has been linked to numerous health disorders. We aimed to investigate the effects of health education on the knowledge, attitudes and practice of vitamin D deficiency among students in Tabuk City, Saudi Arabia. An interventional educational study was conducted among 100 students randomly chosen from secondary schools in Tabuk, Saudi Arabia during the period June to December 2016. All the participants signed a written informed consent. A structured questionnaire was used to assess the basic knowledge, attitude and practice of vitamin D deficiency at baseline and after educational sessions. The Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS, Version, 20, New York) was used for data analysis. They were 100 male students, their ages ranged from (15-18) years. Only 2% new the daily-recommended vitamin-D dose versus 9% post-education, 11% knew the level in the blood versus 45% post-intervention. The participant's knowledge about risk factors and associations of vitamin-D deficiency ranged from 11-38%, 44% versus 54% post-education exposed to the sun. A significant improvement was found regarding the vitamin D knowledge, P-values< 0.05, while no differences were evident regarding the attitude and practice, P-value >0.05. The health education was beneficial with regards to vitamin D deficiency knowledge, but it was not effective in changing the attitude and practice of the participants, further larger longitudinal studies using more effective tools of health education and assessing the barriers to practicing the preventive measures of this major health problem.
