Improving Epilepsy Awareness in Schools: An Examination of Teachers’ Knowledge and Attitudes

Abstract

Epilepsy is most prevalent neurological disorder and it doesn’t know age, racial, social class, geographic, or national boundaries. Epilepsy does not impact only the individual but its impact on family and community. It is related to stigma, epileptic children may be banned from school, adult may not marriage and employment is also affected by epilepsy even in acute seizure person would not render the work unsuitable or unsafe. Epilepsy is a disorder associated with significant psychological consequences like anxiety, depression and poor self-esteem compared with that person who had not epileptic. The aim of the present study was to examine the knowledge, attitude and practice of Epilepsy among school teachers in Ahmedabad, Gujarat. For this purpose, a total of 282 school teachers were selected. The tools used were socio-demographic data sheet and KAP questionnaire. Findings of the present study indicated that majority of the participants had heard and read about epilepsy, and know person with epilepsy. Majority of the teachers had heard about epilepsy from family members followed by parents of epileptic children, family or general physician doctors, newspapers, school and Television. Most of the participants believed that epilepsy is an organic brain disease and showed favourable attitude towards parson with Epilepsy. The participants were very optimistic about prognosis and outcome.