Factors affecting willingness to accept circumcision in male medical students

ObjectiveTo examine cognitive status of circumcision and related factors for providing basis for developing materials of promoting willingness to accept circumcision in key population of AIDS prevention.MethodsCluster random sampling method was used to select 581 students of grade 1-4 from a medical university and a cross-sectional survey was conducted with a self-administrated questionnaire.ResultsThe male students had certain understanding of the hazards of too long foreskin or phimosis and the common causes of surgery,and the full awareness rates of all hazards and common causes of surgery were 39.65% (224/565)and 7.69% (35/455).Only 38.9% (177/455)of the students realized the operation could prevent human immunodeficiency virus infection and other sexually transmitted diseases.The reasons for the students not to choose the surgery were no health risk caused by phimosis(76.31%,190/249),worrying about the risk of surgery(38.96%,97/249),without knowledge about medical benefits of the surgery(26.51%, 66/249),worrying about the influence of the surgery on sexual function(22.89%,57/249),and worrying about high cost of the surgery(15.66%,39/249).The acceptance rate of the surgery was increased to 33.06% (81/253)after knowing very low surgical complication rate and the preventive effects for AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases among the students.ConclusionPopularizing related knowledge and making the surgery more safe and less cost may increase the willingness to accept circumcision among male medical students.