Analysis of the Effect of Medical Science Popularization on Enhancing the Health Literacy of Junior High School Students in Infectious Diseases
Wang Juxia
Lu Ling
Gao Tingting
Zhang Xuemin
Ding Shulong
Shi Fengjuan
Sun Mengqing
Pang Jinxia
Abstract：OBJECTIVE To analyze the effect of medical science popularization on enhancing the infectious disease health literacy of junior high school students and provide a reference for health science popularization in school.METHODS A stratified cluster random sampling approach was employed to recruit 263 students from the seventh to ninth grades at Fuyang Experimental Middle School between September in 2023 and May in 2024.A baseline survey on infectious disease health literacy was then carried out.Subsequently,a team of medical science popularization instructors was established.Taking into account the seasonal characteristics of infectious disease prevalence,timely science popularization presentations and on-site interactive sessions were organized,targeting the knowledge areas where students had relatively weak understanding.Each event was restricted to 40 minutes.The study aimed to compare the levels of change in students' infectious disease health literacy before and after the intervention.RESULTS The proportions of students who obtained health information from the Internet were 39.8％,63.9％,and 57.6％,while those who obtained it from other sources were 17.0％,3.6％,and 6.5％.The accuracy rate of responses on infectious disease health literacy showed that basic knowledge and concepts(68.9％,73.5％,71.3％),prevention(63.6％,73.3％,72.4％)were higher than management and treatment(42.3％,58.1％,51.9％)and identification of infection sources(44.9％,46.4％,48.4％).The correct answer rates of grade 7 students for eight items such as hepatitis B,influenza,epidemic water and HIV were all below 50％.The infectious disease health literacy scores of students in the three grades showed that they were higher after the intervention than before.The Cohen's d values of the four dimensions were between 0.66 and 0.88,and the effect sizes of the total scores were all greater than 1.CONCLUSION Junior high school students have limited access to health information.The medical science popularization activities in combination with baseline surveys could enhance the health literacy level of students regarding infectious diseases.
Keywords：medical science popularizationjunior high school studentsinfectious diseaseshealth literacy
Publication Date：2025-11-10
Online Publishing Date：2026-01-13(First online date of this platform, not the publication date of the document)
Pages：5( 89-93 )