Abstract

Objective: The study is carrried out in order to assess the changes in mothers’ knowledge of caring for under 2 year - old children suffering from acute diarrhea at Nam Dinh Paediatric Hospital after health education.

Method: The health education intervention study comparing before and after was conducted on 110 mothers with under 2 year - old children with acute diarrhea at Nam Dinh Paediatric Hospital. Research subjects meeting the sampling criteria were interviewed twice using a pre-prepared toolkit. In which, interviewing directly the mother for the first time was carried out when the child’s admission to hospital was stable within a period of 24 hours. The study analyzes to find out the mother’s missing and weak knowledge, conducts health education intervention, and re-evaluate the mother’s knowledge of caring for children with acute diarrhea 1 week after the intervention.

Results: Mothers’ knowledge of taking care of children under 2 years old with acute diarrhea at Nam Dinh Paediatric Hospital is not good. Specifically: Before the intervention, mothers with good knowledge accounted for a very low rate of 4.5%; 8.2% good knowledge; 21.8% average knowledge, 65.5% poor knowledge. After the health education intervention, mothers’ knowledge of caring for under 2 year - old children with acute diarrhea at Nam Dinh Paediatric Hospital has improved significantly. After a week of intervention: Mothers who have very good knowledge is 80.9%, good knowledge is 17.3%, average knowledge is 1.8%, and no poor knowledge.

Conclusion: Mother’s knowledge of taking care of under 2 year – old children with acute diarrhea at Nam Dinh Paediatric Hospital improved significantly after 1 week of intervention. It is necessary to continue to replicate the model of health education for mothers of children with acute diarrhea in other hospitals in Nam Dinh province.