Perceptions of medical sciences students towards probiotics.

BACKGROUND Regarding the importance of probiotics in prevention of different diseases, the knowledge of people particularly health-related professionals about the beneficial effects and availability of probiotic products is important. Considering the limited studies, the present study was conducted to assess the knowledge of medical sciences students as future provider of health information about probiotics in Tabriz, Iran. METHODS This cross-sectional study was carried out on 296 medical sciences students from different faculty majors with mean age of 22 ± 4 years. The students completed two self-administered questionnaires; the one was about the demographic characteristics and the other one with nine closed questions as for knowledge as well as probiotics and their health effects and 2 questions related to availability of probiotic products. Scoring of 9 knowledge questions was divided to three sections 0-3, 4-6, 7-9 and classified as poor, acceptable and good, respectively. The Chi-square test was used to examine the differences in knowledge of the students across different gender, major and degree groups. RESULTS Six percent of students had poor, 43% acceptable, and 51% good knowledge. Total mean±(SD) of knowledge was 6.25 ±1.6 . Answers of students about the availability of probiotic products were 36.9% low, 48.1% moderate, and 15% high. Comparison of knowledge result between different major and degree groups was statistically significant (P<0.05). CONCLUSION Although students had approximately acceptable level of knowledge about probiotics and their health effects, their awareness about common available form of probiotic products was low. The use of efficient co-educational materials such as teaching new findings for students may be beneficial.