Health Education Barriers, Encountered by Nurses at Oral Healthcare units.

Abd El Azize, Th; Ibrahim, M. AF

doi:10.21608/menj.2016.120409

Health Education Barriers, Encountered by Nurses at Oral Healthcare units.

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

Th Abd El Azize ¹
M. AF Ibrahim ²

¹ Medical Surgical Department, Faculty of Nursing, Alexandria University. Egypt

² Nursing Education Department, Faculty of Nursing, Alexandria University. Egypt

10.21608/menj.2016.120409

Abstract

World-wide accepted methods for prevention and management of oral health problems are the health education messages. Expert health educators are required with appropriate knowledge, skills related to the recognition, diagnosis, caring and referral for patients with oral health complains. Nurses are facing multiple difficulties when assuming health education activities with dental patients. Therefore, this is a descriptive study, aimed to determine the health education barriers encountered by nurses at oral healthcare units. The study was conducted at the two major oral health settings in Alexandria namely; Alexandria Dental Research Center at Smoha and Free dental and oral clinic in El Amery University hospital. Convenient sample comprised of 125 nurses; 35 from Alexandria Dental Research Center at Smoha and 70 from free dental and oral clinic in El Amery University hospital. Health Education Barriers Questionnaire (HEBQ) was used to collect the necessary data of the study which was developed by Abd El Mohsen in 2009 and modified by the researchers. Based on the analysis of the subject's responses, the results revealed that: the nurses at oral health units have a serious lack in knowledge regarding health education process and there are several barriers and difficulties faced them in providing oral health education related to themselves such as limited communication skills and lack of time. For barriers in patients: there were health beliefs and decreased level of education. For health setting and staff, there is no suitable place for health education, increase work load and staff shortage. The major recommendation of present study is to develop an oral health education strategic plan for nurses to help them; managing any obstacles may face them in oral health education.

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