Need assessment for HIV/AIDS education: the level of knowledge about transmission in some risk groups in Turkey.
BACKGROUND
Every year, the number of HIV/AIDS cases increases twice as much as the year before in Turkey. The authors anticipate that the actual numbers of HIV/AIDS cases in Turkey are higher than the number of cases diagnosed and reported.


METHODS
This review summarizes the results of some previous studies that were conducted among various risk groups, such as high school and university students, barbers, hair dressers, nurses, pharmacists and doctors, men and women engaged in the sex trade, and security workers in different regions of the country. The responses of participants to similar questions of the studies on the transmission of HIV/AIDS were evaluated in this review.


RESULTS
The studies that have been conducted among different risk groups in different regions have shown that in spite of the low prevalence of HIV/AIDS in Turkey, many risk groups still do not have adequate or correct information on the prevalence and transmission of the disease.


CONCLUSIONS
Effective and extensive health education on HIV/AIDS, and the practice of healthy lifestyle would change the epidemiology of the disease in Turkey.
Ozcebe
Hilal
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Department of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, University of Hacettepe, Ankara, Turkey.