Date of Award

8-2024

Document Type

DNP Project

College

School of Nursing

Degree Name

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP)

Department

Nursing

First Advisor

Melinda Nwanganga

Second Advisor

Karen J. Anderson

Abstract

Background

Research reports that cardiovascular disease (CVD) has been a national and global health problem for many years, and that knowledge has increased regarding its prevention (Hennekens, 2020). However, according to Hennekens (2020), CVD remains the number one cause of death in America and most developed countries worldwide. The lack of perception and knowledge of actual CVD risk in the young adult population may be contributing to this deadly disease. This project evaluated the effectiveness of education on CVD risk perception and modifiable health behaviors of college students.

Purpose

This project’s purpose was to assess college students' perception of their CVD risk with their current health behaviors. Education was used to increase students' knowledge of CVD and influence their CVD risk perception. and bring awareness to how modifying health behaviors can reduce their CVD risk. The project explored how students' perception of their CVD risk affects their health behavior. The aim was to show that if education increases students' CVD risk perception, then students would adjust their health behaviors to lower their risk of CVD.

Methods

This was a quality improvement project that focused on improving the CVD risk perception and modifiable risk behaviors of a population of college students using a one-group pre-test post-test design. Fifteen students signed the consent to participate and took the pre-intervention surveys to evaluate their CVD risk perception and health behaviors (nutrition and exercise). Students participated in an eight-week online CVD education program then repeated the surveys. The Wilcoxon Signed Rank test was used to evaluate the participants’ pre- and post-CVD risk perception and health behaviors. Then a Pearson Correlation Test (Spearman’s rho) was used to evaluate the correlation between the participants’ CVD risk perception and health-promoting behavior was evaluated.

Results

At the end of the eight-week CVD education program, 13 out of 15 students completed the program. The results showed that there was significant improvement in the participants’ unknown risk perception (p = 0.0035). However, there was a non-significant increase in the participants’ dread risk perception (p = 0.068) and a non-significant decrease in the participants’ risk perception (p = 0.36). There was also a non-significant increase in participants’ physical activity (p = 0.054) and a non-significant increase in the participants’ nutrition (p = 0.152).

Conclusion

The results of this project showed that although a structured CVD education program had a slight positive impact on college students’ nutrition, health-promoting behavior, and dread CVD risk perception, and a slightly negative impact on the participants risk perception, the impact was not statistically significant. However, the results showed the CVD education intervention had a positive statistically significant impact on the participants’ unknown CVD risk perception. Conclusive evidence from analyzing the link between college students’ CVD risk perception and their health-promoting behavior shows that there is no correlation between CVD risk perception and health-promoting behavior.

Subject Area

Cardiovascular system--Diseases; Nursing; College students--Health and hygiene; Health behavior

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