[KAP study of mothers referred to health centers of ahwaz, toward ascariasis of children, Southwestern Iran]

ABSTRACT

Intestinal parasitic infections are one of the health problems in developing countries. Now one to two milliard people in the world are affected by ascariasis annually, and every year people are spending heavily to treat. All the problems of the ascariasis emission can be controlled by health education programs, which cost less than treatment of the disease. This study was performed to assess health knowledge, attitude and practice of mothers referred to health centers of Ahvaz about ascariasis of children in 2006.In This descriptive analytical research 214 mothers were selected randomly from ten health centers. Using questionnaires the data were collected. Gathered data were analyzed by SPSS-13 software. The results implied that 77. 6% of the mothers were housewives. 9.8% were illiterate. The findings indicated that the knowledge of the mothers was [77. 6%] at a weak level, their attitude was [68.2%] at the middle level, and their practice was [84.1%] at the weak level about ascariasis control and prevention. In this study there were a significant correlation between health knowledge, attitude and practice at confidence interval of 95%. A significant relation was also seen between health knowledge, attitude, practice and mothers occupation and literacy at confidence interval of 95%. With regard to the results of this study the government should pay more attention to improve efficient and effective health education programs to increase the knowledge, attitude and practice about prevention of the ascariasis disease