COVID 19 PREVENTION PRACTICES AND ASSOCIATED FACTORS AMONG UNIVERSITY OF GONDAR ACADEMIC STAFF, GONDAR, ETHIOPIA, 2021: APPLICATION OF HEALTH BELIEF MODEL USING STRUCTURAL EQUATION MODELING APPROACH

Abstract

Abstract Introduction: The 2019 Novel Corona Virus Disease is caused by the SARS Corona Virus 2 and spread to number of countries. Globally, as of June 18, 2021 there have been 177,108,695 cases and 3,840,223 deaths. Despite it is highly contagious disease prevention measures are overlooked by the university community including academic staff and there is also lack of evidence on prevention practice and its associated factors among academic staffs. Objective: To determine the magnitude of COVID 19 prevention practice and identify its associated factors among university of Gondar academic staff Gondar, Ethiopia, 2021. Method: Institutional based cross-sectional study was conducted among academic staff of university of Gondar from April 10 to May 10/2021. Daniel soper’s Sample Size Calculator was used to determine the sample size and 616 academic staffs were considered. Proportional allocation to each campus and then simple random sampling technique was employed. Data was collected through pretested self-administered questionnaire and analyzed using StataV14. Structural equation modeling was performed to assess the relationship between health belief model constructs and other modifying factors. A p-value of less than 0.05 and a 95% confidence interval were used to declare statistical significance. Result: A total of 602 academic staffs were participated. The mean age of the participants was 32.38 (± 5.83) years. The magnitude of good COVID 19 prevention practice was 24.8%. The HBM model was well fitted to the data and explained 55% of the variance in practice. Perceived barriers (? = -0.37, p < 0.05), self-efficacy (? = 0.32, p < 0.05), perceived susceptibility (? = 0.23, p < 0.05) and perceived benefit (? = 0.16, p < 0.05) were the direct significant predictors of prevention practice. Conclusion: The magnitude of good COVID 19 prevention practice was low. The HBM explained great amount of variance of practice and key HBM variables were significantly associated to practice. Carefully planned intervention that considers those significant factors should be designed and implemented to raise the magnitude of good practice. Keywords; COVID 19, Practice, Structural equation modeling, Health belief model