Survey of Mother's Knowledge and Practice Regarding Care of 0-5 Years Old Children with Acute Diarrhea

Introdaction & Diarrhea is second common illness in childhood period and one of the main reasons of Morbidity and Mortality among children in the developed countries. Annual incidence of diarrhea is 1. 3-milliard and mortality rate is 3.2 million in children under 5 years old in the world. In Iran one – fourth of mortality in this years related to diarrhea. Family role, especially mothers role in health promotion, prevention of diarrhea and care of ill child is very important. Mothers practice and knowledge are very effective on the health of child.This study was carried out To survey mothers knowledge and practice regarding care of 0-5 years old children with acute diarrhea in outpatient department of Ghods hospital in Qazvin city. This cross-sectional study conducted to evaluate the knowledge and practice of 54 mothers with children under 5 years old, referred to outpatient department of Ghods hospital, for two months of summer in 2005. The measuring instrument was questionnaire that filled out with interviewing. This questionnaire had two section (Demographic Questions and Questions regarding knowledge and practice of mothers). Data were analyzed by using Spss v11/ win software. The findings indicated that majority of mothers had average knowledge (%50) and 74/1% of Mothers had average practice. So, the findings showed that, between knowledge and practice of mothers with literacy level were Significance correlations. (P=0/01 and p= 0/03)But, knowledge and practice of mothers had not any Significance correlation with past education about care of diarrhea, age and work status. So, between knowledge and practice was a significance correlation (p=0/01) According to the results, Majority of mothers in this study had knowledge and practice on average level. It is offered to promote awareness of mothers; the programs must be designed and implanted according to the results, because of dangerous complications especially in younger children.