الفهرس 
INTRODUCTIONOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
 |  | from | 179 |  |  |
| | | from | 179 | | |
Abstract
Hepatitis C is arguably the most significant public health problem facing Egypt today. Egypt has the highest countrywide prevalence of hepatitis C virus (HCV) in the world which refers to personal history of parenteral antischistosomial therapy since1960. Now days, the main cause of HCV in Egypt is poor infection control or iatrogenic infection in health care setting as hospital, clinics, and so on. HCV infection has a significant impact on quality of life; it has physical, emotional, social, and financial consequences.
Although man with HCV more than women, there are millions of women live with HCV have a number of specialized needs related to their reproductive and sexual health as menstruation, pregnancy, breastfeeding, labor, and so on. Women with HCV are not only facing physical problems of the disease itself but also psychological and social consequences of it which affect female negatively more than men. There are two main factors may be related to this, the first is social stigma of HCV. The second is their fear about infection of their babies. More over false understanding of different routes of transmission, many women believe that HCV can be transmitted by daily contact and based on it family isolates infected women in separate room. In absence of current HCV vaccine, the behavioral intervention and modification play pivotal role in HCV prevention and management. Hence they firstly need for assessment of their health related behaviors.
The aim of this study was
To assess health related behaviors among female patients with hepatitis C virus.
Material and methods:
The present study was conducted at the outpatient clinics of hepatology center in
El- kabary General hospital. A convenience sample of 100 adult female patients with HCV infection was selected according to the following criteria:
1- Adult female (21-60 years).
2- Able to communicate verbally.
3- Not before 6 months post diagnosis ; since it is expected that this period is enough for female patients to be adapted to the disease process and change (112)
Tools of the study:
Two tools were used for this study
Tool one: Hepatitis C Virus female patient’s knowledge; A structured interview schedule was developed by the researcher after the review of relevant literatures (3,24,65,75) to assess female patient’s knowledge related to hepatitis C. It consisted of three parts:
Sociodemographic data
Medical data: it was divided into two sections:
• Section one: medical history
• Section two: gynecological history
Female patient’s knowledge about HCV
Tool two: Hepatitis C Virus Health Related Behaviors Assessment Tool; this tool was developed by the researcher to assess female patients’ health related behaviors; it was divided into two parts: (24, 88)
Patient’s Health Related Behaviors to prevent transmission of hepatitis C to others.
Patient’s Health Related Behaviors to prevent complications and to improve general health.