• Robert Briggs, Breffni Drumm, Ruth Dwyer, Des O'Neill, Sean P Kennelly, Tara Coughlan, and Ronan Collins.
• Department of Age-Related Health Care, Tallaght Hospital, Dublin, Ireland. briggsr@tcd.ie.
• Ir J Med Sci. 2020 Feb 1; 189 (1): 149-153.

BackgroundAlthough atrial fibrillation (AF) causes one-third of strokes in Ireland, studies have shown that public awareness and knowledge of AF are poor. The Irish Heart Foundation conducted a national AF awareness campaign in 2013.AimsThe aim of this study was to assess the effectiveness of the campaign in promoting awareness of AF in the general Irish population, by analyzing knowledge of AF at a population level pre- and post-campaign.MethodsTwo thousand people were surveyed before the campaign to establish baseline knowledge, and the survey was then repeated in a sample of 1000 people in 2 months after the end of the campaign.ResultsAwareness of AF was low, with 28% (560/2000) of those surveyed reporting they had heard of AF prior to the campaign and 30% (297/1002) after (p 0.347). Of those that had heard of the condition, 58% (174/300) in the pre-campaign group correctly identified AF as an irregular heartbeat compared with 35% (105/297) of the post-campaign group (p < 0.01).ConclusionsOur study shows that overall public knowledge of AF in Ireland is generally poor. While this pilot national awareness campaign had no positive impact on awareness levels, there are several possible reasons for this including the limited funding allocation to the campaign. A further AF awareness campaign is planned for next year.

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