Avaliação do conhecimento de farmacêuticos e estudantes de farmácia sobre o transtorno do espectro autista no Brasil
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Data
2024-04-05
Autores
Rosa, Larissa Couto
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Universidade Federal do Espírito Santo
Resumo
Pharmacy students’ and pharmacists’ limited knowledge about Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) can have negative impacts on health care for these individuals. In Brazil, there are no studies that assess the knowledge of Pharmacy students and pharmacists about ASD. Therefore, the objective of this study is to assess the knowledge of Pharmacy students and pharmacists about ASD in Brazil. A cross-sectional survey study was conducted between September 2021 and August 2022. Pharmacy students and pharmacists from all five regions of Brazil participated in the survey. Data were collected through an online questionnaire that contained two sections: the first addressed sociodemographic data and contact with people with ASD and the second section contained the items that make up the Autism Stigma Knowledge – Questionnaire (ASK-Q) Brazil. This questionnaire assesses knowledge and stigma about ASD in 49 questions divided into 4 subscales. The instrument considers the following scores for adequate knowledge: diagnosis (11-18 points); etiology (11-16 points); treatment (10-14 points); non-endorsement of stigma (3-7 points). Descriptive statistics, t test to compare mean scores, and Mann-Whitney test to compare unpaired samples were used for statistical analyses. This study was approved by the Research Ethics Committee (Opinion No. 4,464,411). A total of 397 pharmacy students and 413 pharmacists participated in the study. Most students had adequate knowledge in the following domains: etiology (99.0%), diagnosis (97.0%), and treatment (98.7%), and no student demonstrated endorsement of stigma (100.0%). The highest rates of correct answers in the total score were observed among students from public institutions (p=0.001; d=0.5). In the treatment domain, the highest scores were observed among students who had a family member with ASD (p=0.001; d=0.45) and who studied in public institutions (p=0.002; d=0.43). In the diagnosis domain, the highest scores were observed among those who had a family member with ASD (p=0.015; d=0.24) and lived with a person with ASD (p=0.007; d=0.3). Most pharmacists presented adequate knowledge in the domains: etiology (99.0%), diagnosis (99.0%), treatment (98.8%), and no pharmacist demonstrated to endorse stigma (100.0%). In the diagnosis domain, the highest scores were observed among pharmacists who reported having a family member with ASD (p<0.001) and living with a person with ASD (p=0.002). In the etiology domain, the highest scores were among people who lived with a person with ASD (p=0.004). This study revealed that the pharmacists and pharmacy students analyzed had adequate knowledge about ASD. The results may contribute to the development of strategies that improve the continuing education of Brazilian pharmacists.
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Transtorno do Espectro Autista (TEA) , Estudantes de Farmácia , Farmacêuticos