ABSTRACT SUBMITTED FOR ETHIOPIAN PUBLIC HEATH ASSOCIATION 32^ND EPHA ANNUAL CONFERENCE

NAME: NARDOS GELANA (MPH)

ADDRESS OF AUTHOR: E-mail: nardiyegelana2008@gmail.com

Phone: +251921545402

ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA

DATE: 07JAN, 2021

ABSTRACT

TITLE: EVALUATING THE EFFECTIVENESS OF RISK COMMUNICATION PROCESS AND HEALTH COMMUNICATION MATERIALS PREPARED FOR CHOLERA OUTBREAK IN ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA

Background: Since 1970, different parts of Ethiopia have been recurrently affected with cholera outbreaks. During such public health emergencies, timely and correct information can support people at risk to take appropriate protective actions, prevent disease and injury, decrease unnecessary care-seeking, and facilitate relief and recovery attempts. As risk communication activities are complex and costly usually, evaluation assessment are the best approach to advance risk communication interventions and to enhance the feature of health communication materials.

Objectives: This study aims to evaluate the effectiveness of risk communication process and health communication materials done for cholera outbreak at Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Methods: the study is conducted at Addis ketema sub-city, Addis Ababa Ethiopia. The study used community-based cross-sectional design using mixed method. A total of 605 adults were selected using systematic random sampling for quantitative data and 7 purposely selected adults for In-depth interview and 3 key informants were interviewed for qualitative data. Data were collected using a pre-tested structured interviewer-administered questionnaire, semi-structured interview guides and checklist. Five printed communication materials and three cholera spots were selected randomly from the available materials for evaluation. Quantitative data were analyzed using SPSS version 25. A multiple linear regression analysis was done to identify predictors for knowledge for cholera and P-value < 0.05 was used to declare the statistical significance. Qualitative data were entered into open code version 4.02 for analysis and then analyzed using thematic analysis.

Result: The response rate of this study was 96.1%. Respondents exposed for cholera related messages and outbreak information were 71.8% and 52.7% respectively. Respondents have moderate knowledge for cholera with (M=14.72 and SD ±4.02) from (0-34) scale range. Socio-demographic variables, sources of health information, exposure for cholera messages & outbreak information variables explained the variance in knowledge about cholera by 44.5%. Both TV & radio cholera spots were found as simple and easy to understand and printed health communication materials score low quality. Poor documentation, lack of data management system and less attention given for risk communication activities were seen as a gap in the risk communication process done for cholera outbreak (2019) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Conclusion: as this study revealed that risk communication messages has effect in increasing individuals’ knowledge on disease prevention. Even though the cholera spots were found to be simple and easy to understand the quality of printed materials were low and less attention given for the risk-communication activities affect the effectiveness of the risk-communication process. Therefore, strengthening risk communication process is very important to bring desired effects in disease prevention strategies and for effective emergency responses in the future.

Recommendation: attention should be given for risk communication and community engagement section in the emergency operation center and health communication materials should be prepared based on strategic communication principles. Experimental studies are necessary to evaluate the effect of communication and causality.