title: [Educational effectiveness of a group health education program in the workplace and an examination of educational methods to promote behavior modification].
abstract: BACKGROUND
  It is well-known that health education programs carried out in the work place are useful for employees' health promotion. However, the effectiveness of group health education programs for workers as a population approach is unclear.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  The purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of a group health education program in the workplace, and to investigate educational methods which support workers modifying their health behaviors.
  
  
  METHODS
  A total of 289 workers who received a group health education program in the manufacturing industry (mean age, 42.1 ± 11.3 years old; 175 males and 114 females) were enrolled in this study. The group health education program was carried out to educate the subjects about periodontitis, oral health actions and lifestyle behaviors to prevent oral diseases. Participants were required to fill out a self-administered questionnaire which included information about oral health knowledge, oral health actions, lifestyle behaviors and symptoms of periodontitis before, immediately after and one month after the education. We used McNemar's test for the paired comparison of questionnaire responses. The relation between acquiring knowledge about periodontitis and subjects' modification of oral health action, behavior modification and symptoms of periodontitis were examined using the chi-squared test. The relationships of knowledge retention about periodontitis, the modification of the oral health actions and lifestyle behaviors (i.e., cigarette smoking, alcohol drinking and eating between meals), were examined with participants' characteristics (i.e., age, gender and occupational category) using Fisher's exact test.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Knowledge about periodontitis significantly improved immediately after receiving the health education, and this effect of education was evident one month later. However, not all of the knowledge was sufficiently retained one month after the education session. The proportion of participants undertaking desirable oral health actions significantly increased one month after the education, whereas lifestyle behaviors did not alter. The modification of oral health actions improved periodontitis-related symptoms, however, no relationship was found between knowledge acquisition and behavior modification. The characteristics of the participants did not influence knowledge retention about periodontitis or modification of oral health actions.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our group health education program was appropriate and effective at providing knowledge about periodontitis and at modifying oral health actions. We should identify factors that obstruct workers behavior modification, and eliminate them to improve health behaviors.
authors.affiliation: Yamaha Health Care Center, 10-1 Nakazawa-cho, Naka-ku, Hamamatsu, Shizuoka 430-8650, Japan.
authors.forename: Makoto
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kageyama
authors.forename: Keiichi
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Odagiri
authors.forename: Naoko
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Suzuki
authors.forename: Kumiko
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Honda
authors.forename: Kazue
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Onoue
authors.forename: Makoto
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Yamamoto
authors.forename: Isagi
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Mizuta
authors.forename: Akihiko
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Uehara
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D002792:Cholestyramine Resin; D005260:Female; D015438:Health Behavior; D006266:Health Education / Q000379:methods*; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006293:Health Promotion / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D008019:Life Style; D008297:Male; D016272:Occupational Health; D009910:Oral Hygiene; D012044:Regression Analysis; D017132:Workplace
chemical_list: D002792:Cholestyramine Resin