Authors : Youngshin Song, Myoungjin Kwon and Hee-Sun Kim
Abstract: We evaluated the knowledge, management and education needs related to asthma and allergic diseases among elementary school teachers in South Korea. Participants were 191 elementary school teachers assessed using a structured questionnaire. Participants were initially divided into two groups according to whether they had experience asthma and allergic disease. The demographic characteristics and main variables were compared between the groups using independent t-tests and X2-tests; IBM SPSS Statistics 22 was used for these analyses. Pearson’s correlation coefficient (r) was calculated to identify the relationship among the variables in each group. About 40% of teachers had experience in asthma or allergic disease the remainder had no experience. The demographics, except years of education did not significantly differ between these two groups. Participant’s scores for knowledge, disease management and educational needs did not differ between the groups. Notably, the knowledge score of the no-experience group was higher than that of the experience group whereas the opposite was true for disease management scores. Perceptions of the educational needs of both groups were similar. Disease management ability was significantly positively associated with knowledge and educational needs in the experience group. However, there were no relationships between knowledge, disease management and educational needs in the no-experience group.
Youngshin Song, Myoungjin Kwon and Hee-Sun Kim, 2017. Elementary School Teacher’s Knowledge, Disease Management Ability and Educational Needs Regarding Asthma and Allergic Diseases. Journal of Engineering and Applied Sciences, 12: 3576-3580.