Assessment of health perceptions and dietary habits of healthcare workers during the pandemic
Objective: This study aimed to assess health perceptions, dietary habits of healthcare workers in a tertiary hospital during pandemic.
Materials and Method: This cross-sectional study was conducted among health professionals working in Necmettin Erbakan University Meram Medical Faculty Hospital between 01.05.2021-31.08.2021. Participants received a questionnaire including socio-demographic information, Health Perception Scale (HPS) and Healthy Eating Attitude Scale (HEAS).
Results: The mean age of 386 participants was 33.18±7.58 years (19-58) and 53.6% (n=207) were male. Of the participants, 22.1% (n=85) were physicians, 29.8% (n=115) auxillary health personnel, 21.2% (n=82) administrative and 26.9% (n=104) were other staff (cleaning staff, secu-rity…). Among the healthcare personnel, 43.8% were underweight/normal weight, 43.8% over-weight and 12.4% obese. During the outbreak, 22.6% of participants changed their diet, 44.0% gained weight and 22.8% started taking herbs/probiotics to prevent coronavirus. Their attitudes towards healthy eating were found to be high, with a mean total score of 71.94±10.98. Female par-ticipants and physicians had higher levels of knowledge about nutrition (p=0.001). Healthy eating attitude scores were significantly higher among regular exercisers than among those who never exercised (p=0.003Participants’ perceptions of health increased as their level of education increased (p<0.001). Underweight/normal weight participants perceived health to be better than over-weight/obese participants did (p=0.002). There was a moderately significant positive correlation between HRQOL and SBITS total scores (r=0.251, p<0.001). It was observed that healthy eating behavior increased as health perception increased.
Conclusion: The study demonstrated that health professionals’ attitudes towards healthy eating were high. As health perceptions increased, individual attitudes towards eating well also increased. Improving healthcare professionals’ nutritional attitudes and health perceptions will set an example for the rest of society and lead to a healthier society.
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