Effect of Education by Lecture and Pamphlet Methods on Soldiers Knowledge about Meningitis Disease

Meningitis is an important health issue. As crowded areas is a predisposing factor to the meningitis disease, thus, the aim of this study was to survey the effect of education by lecture and pamphlet methods on soldiers’ knowledge about meningitis disease. This research is a Quasi-experimental study with a before and after design which was conducted among the air defense soldiers of Semnan. The sampling method in this study was census and the data gathering instrument was a self-made questionnaire. At first, the knowledge about meningitis disease among soldiers was measured. After on, training was conducted by presence education methods and distribution of educational pamphlet. At the end the questionnaires were given to the research samples. The obtained data were entered into SPSS 21 and were analyzed by using paired t-test, and descriptive statistics including mean and standard deviation. The total score of knowledge about meningitis disease among soldiers before training was 36.3± 3.94 and after training was 65.76±3.57. Actually the paired t-test showed a significant difference between the training score of soldiers knowledge about meningitis before and after trainings (P = 0.001). According to the results of this study, educational interventions causes an increase in the knowledge of soldiers in regards to the meningitis disease. On the other hand, as all the men have to pass a military service period, this period is considered a great time to increase their knowledge.