Assessing the Level of Awareness of COVID-19 and Prevalence of General Anxiety Disorder among the Hail Community, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

Bandar Alsaif, Najm Eldinn Elsser Elhassan, Ramaiah Itumalla, Kamal Elbassir Ali and Mohamed Ali Alzain
Additional contact information
Bandar Alsaif: Department of Public Health, College of Public Health and Health Informatics, University of Hail, Hail 55476, Saudi Arabia
Najm Eldinn Elsser Elhassan: Department of Public Health, College of Public Health and Health Informatics, University of Hail, Hail 55476, Saudi Arabia
Ramaiah Itumalla: Department of Health Management, College of Public Health and Health Informatics, University of Hail, Hail 55476, Saudi Arabia
Kamal Elbassir Ali: Department of Public Health, College of Public Health and Health Informatics, University of Hail, Hail 55476, Saudi Arabia
Mohamed Ali Alzain: Department of Public Health, College of Public Health and Health Informatics, University of Hail, Hail 55476, Saudi Arabia

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 13, 1-10

Abstract: Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has caused a major public health problem around the world. Therefore, the aim of the study was to assess the awareness and prevalence of General Anxiety Disorder (GAD) with regard to COVID-19 among the Hail community, in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, in order to help health authorities to effectively control the pandemic. Methods: A cross-sectional online survey was completed by 412 participants living in Hail, Saudi Arabia. The questionnaire assessed demographic characteristics, knowledge, attitudes, and practices for the prevention of COVID-19, as well as psychological feelings in terms of GAD as an impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Results: The study found that most of the respondents demonstrated good knowledge, attitudes, and practice for COVID-19 prevention. The elderly and employed demonstrated significant positive attitudes and practices ( p < 0.05). Participants with a positive attitude were almost two and a half times (OR = 2.4; 95% CI: 1.54–3.99) more likely to have good practices. Additionally, the rural respondents were less likely (OR = 0.45; 95% CI: 0.21–0.96) to have a positive attitude. Married participants were more than one and a half (OR = 1.60; 95% CI: 1.04–2.44) times more likely to have a positive attitude. The prevalence of GAD was 21.8% and was significantly increased among participants with inadequate knowledge (OR = 2.01; 95% CI: 1.25–3.22), females (OR = 1.92; 95% CI: 1.19–3.09), individuals with chronic diseases (OR = 1.71; 95% CI: 1.02–2.86), and non-Saudi participants (OR = 2.44; 95% CI: 1.02–5.85). Conclusions: Ensuring a sufficient combination of relatively good levels of knowledge, positive attitudes, and desired practices serves as a good approach to preventing the spread of COVID-19. However, the increased prevalence of GAD requires the attention of policymakers. Therefore, a great emphasis should be placed on health awareness campaigns, with a focus on misconceptions and the provision of counseling.

Keywords: attitude; COVID-19; general anxiety disorder; Hail; knowledge; practice (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/13/7035/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/13/7035/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:13:p:7035-:d:586419

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().