engleski

Knowledge and attitudes of preschool children parents from Osijek, east Croatia regarding injury prevention/safety promotion

Child injuries are a growing global public health problem. They have an effect on the family and also demographically and economically on the whole society and quality of life. A cross-sectional study using an anonymous self-reporting questionnaire was conducted in May 2011 among 653 parents of pre-school children which attend kindergartens in the area of Osijek, eastern Croatia. The aim of this study was to determine parents’ knowledge and attitudes regarding injury prevention/safety promotion for preschool children and to evaluate if there is a connection between injuries that involve children and the knowledge and attitudes of their parents regarding injury prevention/safety promotion for their children. The study showed that parents from Osijek have satisfactory knowledge and attitudes in most segments of the research, but also very poor knowledge about keeping drugs safely out of children’s reach, where they inaccurately rely on the assumption that their children will obey their instructions that drugs are not to be touched. From 653 surveyed parents, 8.9% had a child that was injured in some way. Those injuries were most often caused by falls and traffic accidents, while poisoning, suffocation and burns were less common. The survey further showed that parents whose children did have injury, learned more about injury prevention/safety promotion and showed slightly better knowledge than parents whose children were never injured. The study revealed certain gaps in the parents’ knowledge regarding injury prevention/safety promotion for their children that indicates a necessity for additional education of parents that would significantly increase child safety.

Children; Injury prevention; Parents; Croatia

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