Background: According to World Health Organization (WHO), rabies is a vaccine-preventable, zoonotic, viral disease caused by Lyssavirus type 1. It causes 20,000 deaths annually in India. MBBS interns represent the physicians who will graduate and practice medicine from next year. Hence, keeping this in mind, the present study was carried out to assess the knowledge regarding epidemiological determinants, prevention and management of rabies among MBBS interns.

Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted between April 2023 to June 2023 among 200 MBBS interns of Indira Gandhi Government Medical College, Nagpur, Maharashtra. Data was collected by the self-administered, pre-designed, pre-structured questionnaire and was analysed using statistical package for the social sciences (SPSS) software version 25

Results: It was seen that the mean age of participants was 23.34 (±0.859) years. The majority of participants were males

(51.5%). The majority (80%) of interns knew the correct causative agent of rabies, while only 40% knew the correct incubation period of rabies. The majority, that is 63.5%, 85.5% and 75% of interns, knew the correct route, site and schedule of  post  exposure  prophylaxis  (PEP)  respectively.  Only  26.5%  interns  knew  the  correct  management  of category I  animal  bites, while  74.5%  and 89%  knew  the correct management of  category  II  and  category  III  animal bites, respectively. The mean total knowledge score among interns was 13.17±2.63.

Conclusions: The study found that interns with experience in dealing with animal bite cases had significantly higher total knowledge scores. To improve knowledge, interactive animal bite case-dealing sessions and regular CMEs should be conducted.

Keywords: Knowledge, Epidemiological determinants, Prevention, Management, Rabies, Interns