Award Date

12-1-2022

Degree Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Public Health (MPH)

Department

Epidemiology and Biostatistics

First Committee Member

Brian Labus

Second Committee Member

Chad Cross

Third Committee Member

Shawn Gerstenberger

Fourth Committee Member

Linh Nguyen

Abstract

Isolation has been used to prevent the spread of many infectious diseases including COVID-19. The CDC’s isolation recommendations have changed over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, currently infected individuals must stay at home for 5 full days. The CDC cites low compliance rates as one of the reasons for the recent reduction to the number of days in isolation. However, the CDC could only cite studies from other countries due to the lack of studies on isolation compliance in the United States. This study aimed to determine what percentage of UNLV students and staff complied with the isolation guidelines at the time of their first positive COVID-19 lab result, if the percentage of people who complied with the isolation guidelines changed after the CDC updated their recommendations for self-isolation to 5 days, and what reasons prevented UNLV students and staff from complying with the isolation guidelines. An online survey was sent out via email to anyone who reported a positive COVID- 19 test result through the UNLV voluntary report form. Any individual who was at least 18 years of age and had a current or previous affiliation with UNLV, either as a student or employee, was eligible to participate in this study. The results of this study will expand on what is known about isolation compliance and will be among the first studies conducted on adults who reside in the United States. Among the 239 subjects who participated in this research, 92.5% reported isolating the full length of time. UNLV employees were more likely to comply with the isolation guidelines than individuals not employed by the university (p = 0.001). The top reasons given for non-compliance were having mild symptoms, or none at all, and having a housing situation that required individuals to be in close contact with others. The results of this study show a high rate of compliance to the COVID-19 isolation guidelines by a population of adults in the United States.

Controlled Subject

COVID-19 (Disease);Universities and colleges;Education, Higher

Disciplines

Epidemiology | Public Health

File Format

pdf

File Size

599 KB

Degree Grantor

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Language

English

Rights

IN COPYRIGHT. For more information about this rights statement, please visit http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

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Epidemiology Commons

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