Premarital Sickle Cell Genetic Screening Knowledge, Attitude and Practice Compared Among Married and Unmarried Youths in Nigeria

Abstract

Premarital sickle cell genetic screening is a test that determines the genotype of the intending couple before marriage. As a result, counseling is given before and after the test. This study assessed and compared the level of knowledge, attitude and practices of premarital sickle cell screening among married and unmarried youths in Epe, Nigeria. A crosssectional descriptive research design was used to examine 370 participants, using stratified sampling technique. Data were collected with an instrument and analyzed, stating the mean, frequency and standard deviation. Scores were built for knowledge, attitude and practice. Chi-square test with p < 0.05 was used to test the hypotheses. The study revealed that an association exists between knowledge and practice of premarital sickle cell genetic screening among unmarried (X 2 = 6.359, Cramer's v=0.09, p=0.0116, df = 1) and married (X 2 = 12.9325, Cramer's v=0.10, p=0.0003, df =1) youths. Similarly, an association exists between attitude and practices of premarital sickle cell genetic screening for unmarried youth (X 2 = 20.3077, p=0.0007, Cramer's v=0.17, df = 1) but for married youths there was no association (X 2 = 0.0168, p = 0.8969, Cramer's v=0.08, df = 1). Furthermore, finding revealed that 77% of the married participants did not have sickle cell genetic screening test before marriage, while 67% of the unmarried participants were not willing to carry out the test, due to fear of the unknown and stigma. Conclusively, the level of knowledge of the participants' was good (70.06%), attitude was negative towards practices of premarital sickle cell genetic screening. Therefore, continuous health education that focuses on sickle cell genetic screening test could improve the practices among the youth to avert the associated morbidity and mortality.

A Critical Review of Sickle Cell Disease Burden and Challenges in Sub-Saharan Africa

“…[41][42][43] Level of education has been reported as a determinant of good knowledge about sickle cell disease. 44,45 A cross-sectional survey by Rasheed et al 46 on married and unmarried youths in Nigeria revealed that the level of knowledge of participants was good (70.06%); however, participants had negative attitudes towards the practice of premarital sickle cell genetic screening. The findings from that study were attributed to inadequate public health awareness and lack of basic knowledge on the haemoglobin genotype and sickle cell disease.…”