Abstract
Diarrhea is considered as a major cause of mortality in children aged less than five years old. This pre/post interventional study was designed to assess maternal knowledge about diarrhea and implement a community-based health and nutrition education messages. The study was held in Al-Darb Al-Ahamar (ADAA) district, Cairo, Egypt and targeted a random sample of 600 mothers having at least one child under-five years old and complained of at least one previous attack of diarrhea. The study was conducted in three phases. The pre-intervention phase included a base line survey for the mothers and training activities for the community health workers (CHWs). Intervention phase included health and nutrition education sessions; performance evaluation for the CHWs during providing the message. In phase three, the mothers had no instructions for 3 months then the post- intervention interview and feedback sessions were conducted. Results showed that knowledge of mothers about diarrhea (etiological factors and preventive measures) had improved significantly after the intervention. During observation CHWs’ scored 50% of the required tasks in education and communication skills. In the feedback sessions, all the mothers declared that nutrition education sessions were highly valuable, and asked for on-going support and training programs. The current study found that health and nutrition education sessions were successful in improving mothers’ knowledge regarding preventive measures and management of diarrhea. CHWs are effective health education providers especially in household based intervention. Thus, health services should support community based interventions to reinforce mothers’ knowledge and practices towards their sick children.
Highlights
Diarrheal disease is an important public health problem among under-five children in developing countries (Kumar & Subita, 2012)
The EDHS 2014 reported that 14% of the children had diarrhea in the two weeks preceding the survey at the national level
The project was executed by a Unified Group (UG) Organization that focuses on improving child health and nutrition as it works through community development associations in Egypt to train physicians and community health workers (CHWs) as health and nutrition educators
Summary
Diarrheal disease is an important public health problem among under-five children in developing countries (Kumar & Subita, 2012). Different literatures show that the magnitude of childhood diarrheal disease varies across the globe from 3.6% in India, 21.4% in Iraq and 19.6% in Egypt to 32.7% in Tanzania (Kumar & Subita, 2012). In developing countries like Egypt, the etiology of diarrheal disease among under-five children is complex and the relative contribution of each factor varies as a function of interaction between socioeconomic, environmental, and behavioral variables (Walker et al, 2007). The magnitude of improvement has been questioned by other studies reporting that diarrhea is still the leading cause of death in spite of substantial decline of diarrhea-related mortality (Egyptian Demographic and Health Survey [EDHS], 2014; Yassin, 2000). The EDHS 2014 reported that 14% of the children had diarrhea in the two weeks preceding the survey at the national level
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