The importance of preventive child care from the point of view of mothers

Abstract

Objective: To assess protective behaviour of mothers who have children between the age of 0–16 years concerning immunization, nutrition and periodic health care. Methods: A cross-sectional and descriptive study held at Sakarya, Turkey, which inclusion criteria were: having child/ children between the age of 0-16 years, sharing the same domicile with them, giving informed consent to participate in the study. The study group (n=368) was randomly selected among mothers fulfilling the above criteria. Data were collected between the years of 2003–2004. For sociodemographic inquiry, a semistructured questionnaire consisting of 19 questions was used. After test-retest procedures, these 10 items Likert scale questions (1=low importance, 10=utmost importance) were used to assess mothers’ attitudes towards their offsprings’ immunization, nutrition, and periodic health care. Results: The score for immunization (9.4±1.2) was leading; nutrition (8.5±1.4) and periodic health care (8.2±1.6) were found relatively less important by the mothers. The attributed importance to nutrition and periodic health care was significantly increasing with higher education levels (r=0.34, p<0.001; r=0.24, p<0.001, respectively) while there was no correlation between immunization and mothers’ education level (r=0.1, p=0.06). Conclusion: Families should be educated in terms of child care, emphasizing the importance of nutrition, immunization and periodic health care. This study suggests that childhood vaccines are well known and appreciated by mothers of all levels of education.