A Pre Experimental Study to Assess the Effectiveness of Structured Teaching Program on Knowledge Regarding Cancer and its Warning Signs among Adults

Abstract

Introduction: Cancer has become one of the ten leading causes of death in India. Nurses play a prominent role in the prevention and detection of cancer. Today, the nurse serves the public as a teacher, and health education is one of the functions of nursing. In this study, adult was chosen because keeping in mind that they will take an active involvement in creating the society to know more about the cancer and its warning signs to prevent from cancer. Methods: A Pre- experimental one group pretest post-test design was used in this study. Purposive sampling technique was used to select the sample. The sample size was 40 adults. Data were collected by using structured interview schedule. Analysis was done by using descriptive and inferential statistics. Results: The result showed overall pretest mean score of adults that was 12.8 (SD=2.989) and post-test mean score was 26.97 (SD=3.082). The comparison of pre and post-test knowledge of adults reveals that the overall improvement mean was (13.900) with standard deviation (3.678). Paired ‘t’ test value was computed to evaluate the structured teaching program regarding cancer and its warning signs. The obtained ‘t’ test value was (23.901), which was found greater than the table values (2.045). This indicating the effectiveness of structured teaching program. Association was done between demographic variables and post-test level of knowledge score of adults by using chi-square (χ2 ) test that there was no significant association between age, sex, education, occupation, sources of information and family history of cancer. There is significant association between family monthly incomes with post-test knowledge scores of adults.