Danger signs of acute respiratory tract infections in under-five children: awareness among mothers in the urban slums of Hyderabad, its relation to treatment seeking behaviour
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.18203/2394-6040.ijcmph20185241Keywords:
Danger signs, ARI, Awareness, Mothers, Pneumonia, Under fivesAbstract
Background: Sustainable development goals (SDGs) proposes to all countries an aim to reduce under-five mortality to 25 per 1000 live births by 2030. Acute respiratory tract infections including pneumonia are the leading cause of death among the children less than five years in India. Identification of severe respiratory infections from non-severe forms necessitates that care-givers, especially mothers are aware of danger signs. An attempt is made to study the awareness of danger signs among the Mothers and see its relation to treatment seeking behaviour.
Methods: Community based cross-sectional survey was conducted involving 344 mothers of under-five children living in the urban slums of Hyderabad.
Results: The awareness of mothers about the danger signs of ARI is poor. Very few knew that fast breathing (11 percent), wheezing (4.7 percent), convulsions (1 percent), lethargy (1 percent) are major danger signs of ARI requiring urgent medical attention. A majority of mothers took the child with ARI to private hospital (42 percent) while few approached Govt. Hospital or dispensary (4.7 percent). Many mothers (77 percent) were aware that vaccination against diseases might protect the children against ARIs. The prevalence of acute respiratory infections among the children in the current study (59.3 percent) is much higher that previous studies elsewhere.
Conclusions: A very high proportion (44 percent) of the mothers were ignorant of any danger sign of ARI. The significant association between awareness and positive health care seeking behaviours, like consulting allopathic doctor or govt. hospital or private hospital establishes the evidence that awareness levels are the prerequisite for the positive health care behaviour.
References
WHO. Under-five mortality. WHO. Available at:http://www.who.int/gho/child_health/mortality/mortality_under_five_text/en/. Accessed on 11 January 2016.
World Development Indicators. Mortality rate, under-5 (per 1,000) Data Table. Available at: http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.DYN.MORT. Accessed on 22 December 2015.
Lahariya C, Paul VK. Burden, differentials, and causes of child deaths in India. Indian J Pediatr. 2010;77(11):1312–21.
Census of India :Medical Certification of Cause of Death. Available at: http://www.censusindia.gov.in/ 2011-common/mccd.html. Accessed on 11 January 2016.
Hart CA, Cuevas LE. Acute respiratory infections in children. Revista Brasileira de Saúde Materno Infantil. 2007;7(1):23–9.
The State of Asia-Pacific’s Children 2008 - Child Survival. Available at: http://www.unicef.org/ sapc08/report/report.php. Accessed on 27 August 2015.
Jain N, Lodha R, Kabra SK. Upper respiratory tract infections. Indian J Pediatr. 2001;68(12):1135–8.
Vashishtha VM. Current status of tuberculosis and acute respiratory infections in India:much more needs to be done! Indian Pediatr. 2010;47(1):88–9.
WPRO. WHO/UNICEF Joint Statement: management of pneumonia in community settings. WPRO. Available at: http://www.wpro.who.int/ child_adolescent_health/documents/EN_Pneumonia_reprint/en/. Accessed on 27 December 2015.
Challa S, Gangam S, Amirapu P. Acute respiratory infections in the children of the Southern states of India, with a special focus on the newly carved states. Int J Contemporary Pediatr. 2015: 395–400.
National Family Health Survey, India 2015-2016 (NFHS-4) Woman's Questionnaire;National Family Health Survey. Available at: http://rchiips.org/nfhs/ nfhs4.shtml. Accessed on 13 January 2016.
Epi Info™. CDC. Available at: https://www.cdc.gov /epiinfo/index.html. Accessed on 11 October 2016.
Census of India: Provisional Population Totals : India : Census 2011. Available at: http://www. censusindia.gov.in/2011-prov-results/indiaat glance.html Accessed on 13 October 2016.
Country Profiles. Available at: http://www.uis. unesco.org/DataCentre/Pages/country-profile. aspx?code=IND®ioncode=40535 Accessed on 13 October 2016.
Statistics. UNICEF. Available at: http://www. unicef.org/infobycountry/india_statistics.html. Accessed on 13 October 2016.
Gupta N, Jain SK, Ratnesh, Chawla U, Hossain S, Venkatesh S. An evaluation of diarrheal diseases and acute respiratory infections control programmes in a Delhi slum. Indian J Pediatr. 2007;74(5):471–6.
Sreeramareddy CT, Sathyanarayana TN, Kumar HNH. Utilization of health care services for childhood morbidity and associated factors in India:a national cross-sectional household survey. PLoS ONE. 2012;7(12):e51904.
Deshmukh PR, Dongre AR, Sinha N, Garg BS. Acute childhood morbidities in rural Wardha:some epidemiological correlates and health care seeking. Indian J Med Sci. 2009;63(8):345–54.
Herman E, Black RE, Wahba S, Khallaf N. Developing strategies to encourage appropriate care-seeking for children with acute respiratory infections:an example from Egypt. Int J Health Plann Manage. 1994;9(3):235–43.
International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS), 2010. District Level Household and Facility Survey (DLHS-3), 2007-08: India. Andhra Pradesh: Mumbai: IIPS.
Challa S, Chowdavarapu RR, Pattnaik S, Mathai D. Mapping the awareness levels of mothers about the danger signs of acute respiratory infections in children of the Southern States of India, its relation with treatment seeking behaviour. Int J Infect Dis. 2016;45:294–5.