Assessing Healthcare Workers’ Knowledge and Their Confidence in the Diagnosis and Management of Human Monkeypox: A Cross-Sectional Study in a Middle Eastern Country

Abstract

The ongoing multi-country human monkeypox (HMPX) outbreak was declared as a public health emergency of international concern. Considering the key role of healthcare workers (HCWs) in mitigating the HMPX outbreak, we aimed to assess their level of knowledge and their confidence in diagnosis and management of the disease, besides the assessment of their attitude towards emerging virus infections from a conspiracy point of view. An online survey was distributed among HCWs in Jordan, a Middle Eastern country, during May–July 2022 using a questionnaire published in a previous study among university students in health schools in Jordan. The study sample comprised 606 HCWs, with about two-thirds being either physicians (n = 204, 33.7%) or nurses (n = 190, 31.4%). Four out of the 11 HMPX knowledge items had <50% correct responses with only 33.3% of the study respondents having previous knowledge that vaccination is available to prevent HMPX. A majority of study respondents (n = 356, 58.7%) strongly agreed, agreed or somewhat agreed that the spread of HMPX is related to a role of male homosexuals. Confidence in the ability of diagnosis based on the available monkeypox virus diagnostic tests was reported by 50.2% of the respondents, while the confidence levels were lower for the ability to manage (38.9%) and to diagnose (38.0%) HMPX cases based on their current level of knowledge and skills. Higher confidence levels for HMPX diagnosis and management were found among physicians compared to nurses. The endorsement of conspiracy beliefs about virus emergence was associated with lower HMPX knowledge, the belief in the role of male homosexuals in HMPX spread, and with lower diagnosis and management confidence levels. The current study highlighted the gaps in knowledge regarding HMPX among HCWs in Jordan as well as the lack of confidence to diagnose and manage cases among physicians and nurses. Raising the awareness about the disease is needed urgently considering the rapid escalation in the number of cases worldwide with reported cases in the Middle East. The attitude towards male homosexuals’ role in HMPX spread necessitates proper intervention measures to prevent stigma and discrimination among this risk group. The adoption of conspiratorial beliefs regarding virus emergence was widely prevalent and this issue needs to be addressed with proper and accurate knowledge considering its potential harmful impact.

COVID-19 Vaccine Booster Dose Acceptance: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

“…On the other hand, Norhayati et al found that the pooled proportion of COVID-19 vaccine acceptance was the highest in Southeast Asia at 74% and the lowest in the Eastern Mediterranean region at 52% [ 93 ], which was consistent with an earlier review, which found that COVID-19 vaccine acceptance was over 90% in Southeast Asia, with the lowest proportions of acceptance in the Middle Eastern countries [ 9 ]. The Middle East’s low vaccine acceptance was linked to the widespread belief in conspiracies regarding emerging virus infections and subsequent control measures that harmed vaccination acceptance and uptake [ 87 , 111 , 112 ]. Furthermore, these variations may reflect varying levels of trust in information from government sources.…”

Monkeypox: A Comprehensive Review

“…Previous and current evidence show unsatisfactory monkeypox knowledge among healthcare workers and students in health schools [ 123 , 124 , 125 , 126 ]. In addition, low levels of confidence to diagnose and manage monkeypox were shown in various settings [ 127 , 128 ]. This highlights the urgent need for educational and training intervention measures to help in the prevention and proper control of the ongoing outbreak.…”

“…In a recent review by Di Gennaro et al, the implementation of proper public health responses to contain the MPXV spread was delineated comprehensively [ 70 ]. Specifically, the specific actions at both the community and healthcare settings included: (1) vigilant surveillance for early detection and isolation of cases [ 70 ]; (2) training of healthcare workers to enable accurate and timely clinical diagnosis considering the current evidence of low self-reported confidence in the ability to diagnose and manage the disease among physicians and nurses [ 123 , 127 , 128 ]; (3) availability of accurate laboratory diagnostic kits cannot be overlooked, in light of the long list of differential diagnoses for patients presenting with unexplained acute rash with other nonspecific symptoms [ 70 , 71 ]; and (4) adherence to proper infection control measures, including the use of PPE and disinfection procedures [ 70 ].…”

Level of Knowledge regarding Monkeypox among Peruvian Physicians during the 2022 Outbreak: A Cross-Sectional Study

“…Other authors have reported a higher rate, with 69.8% of physicians that knew about a speci c monkeypox vaccine according to a study from Saudi Arabia [22]. On the other hand, lower percentages have been reported in Jordan (33.3%), and Indonesia (36%) [21,31]. It is worth mentioning that by the time our study was conducted, only a few countries had started their vaccination campaign, and none of the Latin American countries had monkeypox vaccines available [32,33], all of which could have explained why almost 40% of our study population was not familiar with the vaccine.…”