Comparing knowledge and attitudes to dementia care in Brazilian and UK GPs to guide future decisions about educational interventions

Jacinto, Alessandro Ferrari; Gordon, Adam Lee; Samra, Rajvinder; Steiner, Ana Beatriz; Mayoral, Vania Ferreira de Sá and Citero, Vanessa de Albuquerque (2018). Comparing knowledge and attitudes to dementia care in Brazilian and UK GPs to guide future decisions about educational interventions. Gerontology and Geriatrics Education (Early Access).

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/02701960.2018.1551216

Abstract

Background: Dementia training for Brazilian GPs is underdeveloped. We investigated knowledge and attitudes to dementia management amongst Brazilian GPs and compared these with previous UK findings to inform future decisions about how training is structured.


Methods: 115 Brazilian GPs were asked to complete a Portuguese translation of a questionnaire previously used in the UK. This comprised a 14-item multiple-choice knowledge quiz, and a 5-point Likert-scale questionnaire assessing attitudes across 10 dementia management domains. Exploratory factorial analysis was conducted for attitudes.


Results: Attitudes towards dementia demonstrated the same underlying factor structure, “heartsink” and “heartfelt” factors, in Brazil as in previous UK studies, explaining 61.6% of variance in responses. Knowledge scores were negatively correlated with both heartfelt and heartsink factors.


Conclusions: Greater knowledge about dementia was associated with some pessimism about dementia care. The similarity in the structure of attitudes towards dementia management between Brazilian and UK GPs provides a starting point for shared educational approaches targeting attitudes.

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