{"title":"HIV health literacy and knowledge of young adults studying at a US university","authors":"Oxserio Benites, Regina L Hale","doi":"10.31838/HIV21.02.02","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Health literacy is an individual’s understanding of and ability to make decisions related to health information. High levels of health literacy are beneficial in making informed health-related decisions. Knowledge related to HIV is relevant to society as >36 million individuals are estimated to be living with HIV worldwide. This research study explored HIV knowledge of young adults enrolled at a university in the US. Study participants (N = 105) completed the Brief HIV-Knowledge Questionnaire. While the mean survey score was 77%, participants aged 18–19 years scored an average of 54%. Those who had been tested for HIV scored significantly higher than those who had not been tested. Moreover, 64% reported having an HIV-negative status but only 39% reported having been tested for HIV. The results indicate that HIV education related to transmission, protection, and testing are needed.","PeriodicalId":35457,"journal":{"name":"HIV Nursing","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"HIV Nursing","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.31838/HIV21.02.02","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q4","JCRName":"Nursing","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Health literacy is an individual’s understanding of and ability to make decisions related to health information. High levels of health literacy are beneficial in making informed health-related decisions. Knowledge related to HIV is relevant to society as >36 million individuals are estimated to be living with HIV worldwide. This research study explored HIV knowledge of young adults enrolled at a university in the US. Study participants (N = 105) completed the Brief HIV-Knowledge Questionnaire. While the mean survey score was 77%, participants aged 18–19 years scored an average of 54%. Those who had been tested for HIV scored significantly higher than those who had not been tested. Moreover, 64% reported having an HIV-negative status but only 39% reported having been tested for HIV. The results indicate that HIV education related to transmission, protection, and testing are needed.