Published Paper Details:

Polycystic Ovarian Disease is a prevalent hormonal disorder seen among adolescent girls. The current study was aimed to assess awareness regarding Polycystic Ovarian Disease and its risk assessment among college students. The objectives of the study were to assess the awareness regarding PCOD among college students, assess the risk of PCOD among college students and to find the association between awareness regarding PCOD and selected socio personal variables of college students. The research question was What is the awareness regarding PCOD and its risk assessment among college students? A descriptive survey design was used for the study which was based on Nola J Pender's Health Promotion model. Pilot study was conducted among 15 college students at Sree Paramekavu College and the main study was conducted among 145 students at St. Thomas College. The tools used were structured questionnaire to assess the socio demographic variables, awareness regarding Polycystic Ovarian Disease and questionnaire for risk assessment which includes weight, height and BMI. The findings of socio personal data showed that 39.31% belonged to the age of 20, 53.1% studying in 2nd year, 78.62% was staying in home, 96.55% was consuming junk foods, 66.21% had previous knowledge about Polycystic Ovarian Disease, 33.79% had no source of information, 89.66% had no PCOD. Among 15 students with Polycystic Ovarian Disease, 33.34% had PCOD since 3 year, 60% were not taking medicines and all of the them had done lifestyle modification. The assessment of awareness revealed that 66.9% of college students had average awareness whereas 26.9% had poor awareness and 6.2% had good awareness, and risk assessment showed that 73.1% students was having moderate risk and 26.2% was having low risk for Polycystic Ovarian Disease and 0.70% had high risk for Polycystic Ovarian Disease. There is significant association between awareness regarding Polycystic Ovarian Disease and year of study, other variables such as type of stay, presence of PCOD, previous information of PCOD and its source showed no significant association between awareness regarding Polycystic Ovarian Disease. Discussion indicates the importance of implementing targeted educational interventions, promoting lifestyle modifications and enhancing reproductive health literacy among young women could help bridge these knowledge gaps and reduce PCOD risk in the college going population. The study concluded that awareness regarding Polycystic Ovarian Disease and its risk assessment helps in early detection of health problems thereby preventing long term health complications.