The knowledge of Tehran citizens on environmental pollutions, related health effects and their information sources

Mes daghin ia A1, Yunesian M2, Naseri S1, Jafari A3, Moradi A4, Farahdoust F5, Yaghoubi L6 1. Professor, Department of environmental health, Faculty of public health and institute of health research, Tehran University of medical sciences 2. Assistant professor, Department of environmental health, Faculty of public health and institute of health research, Tehran University of medical sciences 3. Instructor, Department of environmental health, Faculty of health, Lorestan University of medical sciences 4. Master of science, Epidemiology, Hamadan University of medical sciences 5. Master of science, Social researches 6. Bachelor of science, Environmental health Abstract Background: Environmental exposures usually occur to chemical, physical and microbiological factors. WHO has evaluated related loading of 25 risk factors that 7 of these are environmental factors. With regard to the lack of comprehensive studies, this survey was carried out in Tehran to investigate the knowledge of the citizens on environmental pollutions, related health effects and their information sources. Materials and methods: Present survey was carried out on 1596 individual upper than 18 years old. Samples were taken randomly. Data was collected by phone interview. In order to determine correlation between qualitative variables, Chi -square test was used. In necessary condition OR index was used. Reliability of questions in any part was tested by principal component analysis. Results: Results of this survey showed that in general 54.2% of people have a good knowledge about environmental pollution and health effects. The knowledge of women, youths (18 - 20years old), university educated people (PhD), westerns and northern, and those who had got their information from radio / TV is more than others. The knowledge of people about the environmental pollution and their health effects with education level and source of information had a significant difference. After elimination the effect of variables that probably interfere with knowledge of people, logistic regression was done. In this case, there was a correlation between education level and information sources. More than 80% of people got their information from radio and TV. Newspaper and social conversation were the next important sources, respectively. Conclusion: Although Tehran citizen knowledge about some environmental problems and related institutions was low, in general, Tehran citizens knowledge about the problem and special health issues resulted from air pollution was good. With regard to importance of environmental factors in public health because of machinery life especially in large cities of our country, more research should be accomplished to identify and how to control them.