Prevalence, knowledge and attitude toward electronic cigarette use among male health colleges students in Saudi Arabia-A cross-sectional study.

Background: Health care professionals have an important role in increasing awareness about smoking harms and serving as role models. This study aims to assess knowledge, attitude and perception toward electronic cigarettes (ECs) as well as prevalence of ECs use among male health colleges students. Method: This is a cross-sectional survey-based study conducted among students in the male campus of five different health colleges over a 4-month period from February 2020 to May 2020. Descriptive analysis was used to assess the knowledge, perception and attitude, and inferential testing was used to evaluate the association of different participant's variables and knowledge toward ECs usage using SPSS. Results: A total of 333 students were included in the analysis. Most of students (n = 205; 61.6%) had never used ECs, while 22.8 and 15.6% used them for recreational and smoking cessation purposes, respectively. Focusing on ECs users from each college individually, medical students had the highest prevalence followed by dental, pharmacy and nursing students (47.4, 40.7, 34.5, and 32%, respectively). Many students had misconceptions and a low level of knowledge about ECs, such as recognizing them as smoking-cessation tools and not knowing whether toxic and carcinogenic components levels in ECs are similar to conventional cigarettes, respectively. Medical students had significantly higher knowledge compared to dental students [3 (2) vs. 2 (1); p = 0.033]. Moreover, smokers were less knowledgeable than non-smokers [2.5 (1) vs. 2.1 (1), p = 0.027]. At least 62.8% of students perceived using ECs as a fashionable alternative smoking method and 59.2% believed that they may become a gateway for smoking addiction. Only 120 (36.0%) health colleges students were confidently able to advise smokers regarding ECs. Conclusion: Our study highlights an increased trend of ECs use accompanied with insufficient knowledge and several misconceptions about ECs among health colleges students. This was associated with a negative influence on their attitude toward ECs use, which would potentially lead to negative consequences on public health.

Knowledge and Practice of Childbearing Women in Saudi Arabia towards Folic Acid Supplement-Evidence from a Cross-Sectional Study.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Neural tube defects are congenital anomalies which canlead to infant death and serious disability. They are initiated during embryogenesis, between the 23rd and 27th day of fetal life, and can be prevented by the administration of folic acid. Therefore, this study aims to evaluate the knowledge and practice of Saudi women at childbearing age regarding NTDs and FA supplementation. METHODOLOGY: This is a cross-sectional study on Saudi women of reproductive age who were asked to complete an online survey to examine their knowledge and practice regarding folic acid supplementation and neural tube defects. Descriptive and simple linear regression analyses were conducted using SPSS v.26 (SPSS Inc., Chicago, IL, USA). RESULTS: A total of 613 women have completed the questionnaire, from which the majority (46.7%) were aged between 36 and 40 years. About 94% of women heard about folic acid and 80% indicated that its deficiency has some relation to neural tube defects. Approximately 37%, 25.3%, and 23.2% of women reported the proper time for folic acid intake to be during first trimester of pregnancy, before pregnancy, or throughout pregnancy, respectively. Linear regression analysis revealed that increase age and education were significantly correlated with a decrease in folic acid administration (p = 0.008) and (p = 0.001), respectively. However, there was no association between time of folic acid administration and income or number of parities. CONCLUSION: Despite the acceptable level of awareness about the relation of folic acid and neural tube defects, our results revealed that more education is required towards the proper time of supplementation among Saudi childbearing women.