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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Public Health
Sec. Public Health Education and Promotion
Volume 12 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2024.1481265
This article is part of the Research Topic Ensuring Public Health: The Active Role of Healthcare Professionals View all 3 articles

The role of nutrition education in the pharmacy curriculum -using the example of knowledge about the health benefits of nuts

Provisionally accepted
Ivana Stevic Ivana Stevic 1Danijela Milenkovic Danijela Milenkovic 1Margarita Dodevska Margarita Dodevska 2Ana V. Pejcic Ana V. Pejcic 3Ana Petrovic Ana Petrovic 1,4Marija Prvulovic Ilic Marija Prvulovic Ilic 1Nevena Ivanović Nevena Ivanović 1*
  • 1 Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia
  • 2 Institute of Public Health of Serbia Dr Milan Jovanovic Batut, Belgrade, Serbia
  • 3 Faculty of Medical Sciences, University of Kragujevac, Kragujevac, Sumadija and Western Serbia, Serbia
  • 4 Nutritional Studio Ana Petrovic, Belgrade, Serbia

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    In recent years, nuts have gained importance because of their nutritional benefits in promoting health and preventing chronic diseases. Despite their recognized role as part of healthy dietary patterns, global consumption is below recommended levels, necessitating an investigation of factors influencing consumption and the impact of nutrition education. Objective: To investigate the attitudes, knowledge and consumption habits of students in Serbia regarding the consumption of nuts and to examine the role and importance of food-or nutrition-related topics in academic curricula in promoting positive attitudes and habits regarding the consumption of nuts among pharmacy students. Methods: An electronic questionnaire was used to collect data for this cross-sectional study. A total of 509 responses were collected, including 382 from pharmacy students (75.0%) and 127 from non-pharmacy students (25.0%).Results: Attitudes toward eating nuts were generally positive, with statistically significant differences found between pharmacy students and non-pharmacy students for 10 statements. The knowledge levels differed, with the mean total number of correct answers in the total sample being 3.9 ± 2.5 (R: 0--11, Mdn: 4) out of 13, and there was a statistically significant difference (p<0.05) between pharmacy students and non-pharmacy students on 8 out of 13 knowledge questions. The study revealed that students obtained information about the health benefits of nuts, mainly from college lectures (51.9%) and mass media (60.9%). More than half of the students (57.8%) expressed a desire for additional information about nuts, which influenced their attitudes significantly more than their level of knowledge. Conclusion:The results showed that pharmacy students had better knowledge and more positive attitudes towards the consumption of nuts compared to non-pharmacy students. Although completion of nutrition-related courses showed some positive influence, this was not statistically significant for most attitudes and beliefs. These findings underscore the potential value of integrating comprehensive nutrition education into pharmacy curricula, as the combination of knowledge and positive attitudes fostered by pharmacy and nutrition education will enable future health professionals to play a critical role in promoting healthier and sustainable eating habits in the population.

    Keywords: Nuts, Pharmacy student, attitudes, knowledge, consumption practices, education nuts, Curriculum, nutritionrelated module

    Received: 15 Aug 2024; Accepted: 08 Nov 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Stevic, Milenkovic, Dodevska, Pejcic, Petrovic, Prvulovic Ilic and Ivanović. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Nevena Ivanović, Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.