Prevention of foreign bodies entering Children's respiratory tracts: The effect of the Caregiver's knowledge, behaviour and attitude.

OBJECTIVES

To explore the effect of the caregiver's knowledge, behaviour and attitude on the prevention of foreign bodies in children's respiratory tracts to provide a basis for publicity and education on foreign bodies in children's respiratory tracts.

METHODS

A case-control method was used to investigate the knowledge, behaviour and attitude of the caregivers of 900 paediatric patients at Hunan Children's Hospital from June 2017 to February 2019. Caregivers of 300 children with foreign bodies removed by rigid bronchoscopy were selected as the case group. Caregivers of 600 children with other conditions were selected as the control group. The knowledge, behaviour and attitude of the caregivers towards foreign bodies in children's respiratory tracts and the demographic characteristics of the two groups were analyzed and compared.

RESULTS

The results showed significant differences for the children in terms of their gender, age and living conditions between the two groups (all p < 0.05) and for the caregivers in terms of their age, educational level, relationship with the child and the number of children in the family (all p < 0.05). There were statistically significant differences in the caregivers' knowledge of foreign bodies in the respiratory tract between the two groups (p < 0.05). In addition, a significant difference was also found between the groups in the caregivers' understanding of the prevention of foreign bodies in the respiratory tract, such as whether they were aware of the specific first-aid measures needed to treat the condition (p < 0.05).

CONCLUSION

The caregiver's relationship to the child, their age, their level of education and the number of children in the family affected the occurrence of the condition, while the caregiver's knowledge, behaviour and attitude regarding foreign bodies in the respiratory tract also had some influence. However, in the future, national multiple-centre courses could be extremely useful in educating caregivers.