Views of Students of Vocational School of Health Services on Infertility and Assisted Reproductive Techniques
Keywords:
Assisted Reproductive Techniques, Ethics, Health Services, Infertility, Reproductive HealthAbstract
Objective: Infertility is a health problem affecting a significant proportion of couples in the modern world. As a result of medical developments, assisted reproductive techniques (ART) offer promising solutions for individuals who want to have children. However, knowledge, attitudes and ethical approaches towards the use of these techniques differ from society to society. This study aims to measure the knowledge level of Vocational School of Health Services (VSHS) students about “infertility” and to determine their awareness levels for ART.
Methods: In our study, a questionnaire was administered to 236 students studying at Mersin University VSHS and who volunteered to participate in the study. However, the questionnaires of 34 students could not be evaluated due to incomplete markings, and the evaluation was completed with the data of 202 students.
Shaphiro wilk test was used to determine the conformity of the data to normal distribution, "Student t test" was used for the comparison of two normally distributed independent variable groups. As descriptive statistics, mean and standard deviation was calculated for numerical variables and count and percentage were given for categorical variables.
Results: When the questionnaire questions were evaluated, a weak negative correlation was found between question 1 and the answers given only to question 8 (r=-0.185, P=0.008). A moderate positive correlation (r=0.509, P=0.001) was found between questions 2 and 3, and a weak positive correlation (r=0.181, P=0.010) was found between questions 2 and 8. Additionally, a weak positive correlation was found between questions 3 and 8 (r=0.328, P=0.001) and a weak positive correlation was found between question 9 (r=0.139, P=0.048).
Conclusion: The VSHS students had a positive opinion about certain basic practices for ART that do not pose a threat to public health and moral values. However, they expressed negative opinions on critical issues such as predetermination of sex determination or oocyte donation in terms of ethics and balance of nature. As a result, it was concluded that the opinions of young people in the health field may be useful in guiding future ART practices.
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