Travelling at my own risk? - A study to evaluate travel health related knowledge, attitudes and risk taking

According to global statistics, international tourist arrivals in 2009 were 880 million. Finns made over 6.5 million leisure and business trips abroad. Far East and other exotic destinations are fashionable where tourists are increasingly exposed to serious diseases and accidents. Risk profiles of Finnish travellers are not well known. In Finland, travellers tend to overemphasize importance of vaccinations and malaria prophylaxis while disregarding other advice. The main objectives of this Master Thesis are to obtain information regarding risk profile and evaluate the impact of the travel health consultation. Data was collected in a survey through questionnaires before and after consultation, during autumn 2008 and January 2009 at the City of Tampere vaccinations and control of infectious diseases Unit. Sample size was 200. The results showed that males intend to take more risks concerning excessive drinking and going out late than females. Males also protect themselves less such as not using condoms. As to the impact of the consultation, out of the 25 identical questions asked before and after the consultation only 4 were found statistically significantly different, and 50.9% did not change their conception of travel related risks. Furthermore 35.5% said that health consultation did not reduce their risk taking. Individual travel related health consultation is vital. It is important, however, that many other channels are opened up in order to widen the possibilities of influencing attitudes for healthier well-being during travel. Asiasanat:Travel health, risk profile, risk taking, Travel medicine, intended behaviour, attitude