Abstract:
The purposes of this correlational predictive research were to study knee osteoarthritis preventive behaviors to examine correlation between age, perceived susceptibility, perceived severity, perceived benefits, perceived barriers, perceived self-efficacy and knee osteoarthritis preventive behaviors and to identify predictive factors of knee osteoarthritis preventive behaviors among professional nurses in tertiary hospitals in Bangkok metropolis. Simple random sampling was used to recruit 145 professional nurses. A set of questionaires were used to collect data, including personal characteristics, perceived susceptibility, perceived severity, perceived benefits, perceived barriers, perceived self-efficacy, and knee osteoarthritis preventive behaviors questionaires. The questionaires were tested for their content validity by five experts. Their CVI were 1.0, 1.0, 1.0, 0.9, 0.8, and 1.0, respectively. Their Cronbach s alpha coefficients were .76, .73, .86, .79, .82 and, .70, respectively. Data were analyzed using Peasons Product Moment Correlation and stepwise multiple regression. The results revealed that : 1. Knee osteoarthritis preventive behaviors of professional nurses in tertiary hospitals in Bangkok metropolis was at moderate level (Mean = 36.06, S.D. = 5.41). 2. Perceived self-efficacy and age were positively and significantly related to knee osteoarthritis preventive behaviors among professional nurses in tertiary hospitals in Bangkok metropolis (r = .200 and r = .572, p .05). 3. Perceived self-efficacy and age were significant predictors of knee osteoarthritis preventive behaviors among professional nurses in tertiary hospitals in Bangkok metropolis (p < .05). They explained 33.8 percent of variance in knee osteoarthritis preventive behaviors