| Objective The aim of this study was to explore level of Alzheimer's Disease knowledge and its related factors among medical college students using new Alzheimer's Disease Knowledge Scale, to provide evidence of reliability and validity for ADKS, and to evaluate health education effects by before and after design.Methods Four hundred seventy three medical college students were randomly selected. Alzheimer's Disease Knowledge Scale (ADKS) was used to measure Alzheimer's disease knowledge. Socio-demographic and major related factors were also collected. Content validity. construct validity, and Cronbach's a coefficient were used to evaluate validity and reliability. Multiple stepwise regression analysis was used to identify significant factors related to the total and seven dimension (risk factors, symptoms, course, assessment and diagnosis, treatment and management, life impact, and care giving) scores of scale. Some subjects were provided health education about Alzheimer's disease to evaluate health education effect.Results (1) Validity evaluation results showed good content validity with high Spearman correlation coefficients between each item and related domain while low correlation coefficients between each item and other domains. Confirmatory factor analysis showed good construct validity with RMSEA 0.058 and CFI 0.92. (2) Internal reliability analysis resulted Cronbach'sαcoefficients for total scale, risk factors, symptoms, course, assessment and diagnosis, treatment and management, life impact, and care giving were 0.586,0.843,0.824,0.772,0.671, 0.411,0.794, and 0.707, respectively. (3) Univariate analysis for ADKS among medical college students showed that college level, major, education level of father and mother, overcoming disease belief, main knowledge resource, and main lessons resource were related to total scores of ADKS and some domains. Based on multiple linear regression analysis, for total scores of ADKS, major and education level of mother were the significant factors. In AD risk factors, college level and main knowledge resource were the predictive factors. Education level of father, overcoming disease belief and main lessons resource were the predictive factors for AD symptoms. For AD course, degree of concern and main knowledge resource were the significant factors. College level, overcoming disease belief, and major were related to AD assessment and diagnosis, treatment and management, and life impact respectively. Grade and main lessons resource were the predictive factors for AD care giving. (4) After health education, total and seven domains scores all improved. Except AD course, AD assessment and diagnosis, before and after scores of total and five domains were statistically significant. Conclusion Alzheimer's Disease Knowledge Scale Chinese version has acceptable validity and reliability. Alzheimer's Disease Knowledge Scale Chinese version can be used for medical college students to sort their Alzheimer's Disease knowledge. Particular health education is effective. |
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