ABSTRACT
This study was done to assess the nurses' knowledge about AIDS. The sample consisted of 137 nurses from the Maternity and Pediatric Hospitals in Alexandria and Tanta [72 and 65 nurses, respectively]. A questionnaire sheet was designed to collect the necessary data about the study subjects as well as their knowledge about AIDS. The findings revealed that these maternity and pediatric nurses in Alexandria and Tanta lacked the basic and essential knowledge about AIDS, as only 13.9% of the study sample in Alexandria and 15.4% in Tanta had good scores for the knowledge about AIDS, as only 13.9% of the study sample in Alexandria and 15.4% in Tanta had god scores for the knowledge questions, while 27.8% and 23.1%, respectively, had fair scores and 58.3% and 61.5%, respectively, of the nurses had poor scores. The lack of knowledge was greater in certain aspects, such as definition of AIDS, mode of transmission, signs and symptoms of AIDS, methods of prevention of this fatal and critical disease, high risk group, precautions to be taken at home or in the hospital and, finally, the nurses' role towards AIDS patients. Actually it is seriously to observed that nurses who expected to educate others and to share in the prevention of this fatal disease have limited knowledge. This necessitates in-service training program to upgrade their knowledge