Kyung Suk Shin1, Hwa Yeon Sun2, David Samuel Kwak3, Byung Wook Yoo3
1Department of Family Medicine, Soonchunhyang University Gumi Hospital, Gumi, Korea
2Department of Interdisciplinary Program in Biomedical Science Soonchunhyang University, Asan, Korea
3Department of Family Medicine, Soonchunhyang University Seoul Hospital, Seoul, Korea
Background: Meningococcal meningitis is a disease that
can cause severe and possibly fatal side effects. To prevent
the spread of meningococcal meningitis, which is a highly
transmissible disease, 16 states in the USA mandate
entering college students to receive meningococcal
vaccination. Nevertheless, South Korea does not. This study
aims to point out the importance of meningococcal
vaccination by comparing the level of general knowledge
and recognition of the requirement for vaccination among
university students in the USA/Canada and Korea. Methods:
The study was conducted using a self-filled questionnaire
survey targeting international and Korean students at one of
Korea's universities. The survey focused on topics such as
knowledge of infectious diseases that can occur at the
dormitory residence, infectious agents and routes of
meningococcal meningitis infection and infection route, and
students' intention to receive meningococcal
vaccination. Results: International university students had a
higher awareness of the importance of infectious disease
pre-vention than Korean students (P<0.05) and also had
higher meningococcal-related knowledge (P<0.05).
International universities strongly recommend meningococcal
vaccination compared to Korean universities (P<0.05), and
the actual vaccination rate was higher than that of domestic
university students (P<0.05). Conclusions: This study found
that the awareness of meningococcal vaccination among
Korean university stu-dents was lower than that of
international university students, and the vaccination rate
was also lower. Because students often do not get
vaccinated due to low awareness of the meningococcal
disease, health education programs can increase their
knowledge about infectious diseases and awareness of
vaccines. Thus, increas-ing the vaccination rate.Korean J
Health Promot 2022;22(3):165-173
Keywords: Meningitis, Meningococcus, Awareness,
Vaccination, Communicable diseases |