Abstract
Background: There have been many studies from different parts of the world that assess the awareness of thyroid disorders. The studies done in Saudi Arabia revealed a good overall knowledge. To assess Taif population awareness and knowledge about thyroid disorder and if there is a correlation between the awareness & awareness knowledge of thyroid disorders with nationality, age, gender, social status, residency, education level, employment and income. Methods: The general population in Taif city, Saudi Arabia was the target of this cross sectional survey. Males and females of various age groups (18-65 years), both Saudi and non-Saudi, were included in the sample. Health workers and medical students were excluded from our research. An Arabic language version of a self administered questionnaire was utilized to acquire data. Results: Our study included 911 respondents, 86.5% of them were females, 63.6% aged 18-30 years and 74.8% have university education. Only about 14% of the studied populations have poor knowledge about thyroid diseases, and about 21% have average knowledge, and about 65.3% of them have high knowledge. The level of knowledge regarding thyroid disorders is significantly influenced by gender (p-value = 0.002). Age, country had no discernible effects on participants' awareness of thyroid diseases, according to our study (p values = 0.027, 0.229, 0.0169 and 0.29, respectively). Conclusion: Only small percentages of the Taif population have poor knowledge about thyroid diseases. We also recommend conducting large services to measure the awareness level of the public in Saudi Arabia about these important disorders.