_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ 908 https://www.id-press.eu/mjms/index ID Design Press, Skopje, Republic of Macedonia Open Access Macedonian Journal of Medical Sciences. 2018 May 20; 6(5):908-912. https://doi.org/10.3889/oamjms.2018.175 eISSN: 1857-9655 Public Health Food Safety Knowledge and Practices of Male Adolescents in West of Iran Amin Mirzaei 1 , Heshmatollah Nourmoradi 2,3 , Mohammad Sadegh Abedzadeh Zavareh 1 , Mohsen Jalilian 1 , Morteza Mansourian 4 , Sajad Mazloomi 3 , Neda Mokhtari 5 , Fariba Mokhtari 1* 1 Department of Public Health, School of Health, Ilam University of Medical Sciences, Ilam, Iran; 2 Biotechnology and Medical Plant Research Center, Ilam University of Medical Sciences, Ilam, Iran; 3 Department of Environmental Health, School of Health, Ilam University of Medical Sciences, Ilam, Iran; 4 Health Management and Economics Research Center, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran; 5 Department of Psychology, School of Humanities, Islamic Azad University, Ilam, Iran Citation: Mirzaei A, Nourmoradi H, Zavareh MSAZ, Jalilian M, Mansourian M, Mazloomi S, Mokhtari N, Mokhtari F. Food Safety Knowledge and Practices of Male Adolescents in West of Iran. Open Access Maced J Med Sci. 2018 May 20; 6(5):908-912. https://doi.org/10.3889/oamjms.2018.175 Keywords: Knowledge; Practices; Food Safety; Food- borne Diseases; Adolescents *Correspondence: Fariba Mokhtari. Department of Public Health, School of Health, Ilam University of Medical Sciences, Ilam, Iran. E-mail: am_karo@yahoo.com Received: 18-Jan-2018; Revised: 10-Feb-2018; Accepted: 23-Mar-2018; Online first: 12-May-2018 Copyright: © 2018 Amin Mirzaei, Heshmatollah Nourmoradi, Mohammad Sadegh Abedzadeh Zavareh, Mohsen Jalilian, Morteza Mansourian, Sajad Mazloomi, Neda Mokhtari, Fariba Mokhtari. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0) Funding: This research was supported by IUMS, Ilam, Iran Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist Abstract BACKGROUND: Every year many people around the world become infected with food-borne infections. Insufficient knowledge and skills related to food safety and hygiene are among the factors affecting the incidence of food-borne diseases, especially in adolescents. AIM: The purpose of this study was to determine the knowledge and practices associated with food safety and hygiene in Ilam city male adolescents. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Three hundred and eighty of male adolescents aged 13 to 19 were selected randomly and entered the cross-sectional study. Data were collected using a researcher-made questionnaire From December 2016 to February 2017. Descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation, independent t-test and one- way ANOVA were used to analyse the data in SPSS software (version 19.0). RESULTS: The findings of the study showed a positive and significant relationship between knowledge and practices related to food safety and hygiene (r = 0.122; p = 0.018). Also, the findings showed that food safety knowledge and practice of adolescents were significantly affected by the level of their education, parental education level, parental employment status and household economic conditions, (p < 0.005). Also, the results showed that the participants generally obtained 57.74% of the knowledge score and 57.63% of practices score. The subjects had the most knowledge about food supply and storage (60%), and the highest practice was related to personal and environmental hygiene, (61.73%). CONCLUSION: The inadequacy of knowledge and performance of adolescents about food safety and hygiene shows the need for implementation of health education interventions in this area. Introduction Food-borne diseases are among the most important public health challenges and one of the major barriers to socioeconomic development worldwide [1]. The results of various studies show that a wide range of infectious diseases spread to humans through unhealthy foods and cause food poisoning, diarrhoea and death [2]. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), in 2010 there were a total of 600 million cases of illness and 420,000 deaths from food-borne diseases worldwide which most of them were related to diarrheal disease agents. Also, according to the report, 31 risk factors for food-borne diseases have been identified, which are responsible for 32 food-borne diseases [1]. Also, food-borne diseases impose high costs on the health system of countries. WHO has estimated the global burden of foodborne diseases to be around 33 million DALYs in 2010 [1]. Pathogenic agents are transmitted to food from all stages of production to distribution and consumption of food through contaminated equipment, food handlers and also final consumers [3]. Several factors affect the incidence of food-borne diseases; the most important of them are contaminated food supplies, inappropriate food storage, providing food from unhygienic sources, and poor personal hygiene [4]. In addition to the factors