Women’s awareness about domestic accidents among toddlers

Accidents are the largest single cause of death after the age of one year and are one of the serious health problems facing the world today. Unintentional injury is the leading cause of death among toddlers. The aims of this study were i) to assess women’s knowledge about the nature and type of most commonly found unintentional domestic accidents among toddlers. ii) to assess the knowledge of women regarding first aid measures against domestic accidents among toddlers. iii) to assess the knowledge of women regarding prevention of domestic accidents among   toddlers. iv) to find out the socio-economic and demographic factors influencing the knowledge level of women regarding domestic accidents among toddlers.  The present study has been carried out in Kottaiyadi, North Vallioor, Anaikulam and Thirumalapuram Villages in Vallioor Panchayat, Tirunelveli District and the sample was included 300 women who had children under five years. A structured questionnaire sheet was developed by the researcher to collect data. Data were collected by interviewing each mother on her home. The data was entered in MS Excel and analyzed using SPSS (13 Version) statistical software. The collected data were analyzed by using Simple proportions, Chi-squared test, Correlation test, “t” test and ANOVA test. A p-value of < 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Data on nature and types of domestic accidents show that 164 (54.7%) out of 300 population had average knowledge, 76(25.3%) of the population had adequate knowledge and 60(20%) of the population had inadequate knowledge. Data on first aid of domestic accidents show that, 146 (48.7%) of the population had average knowledge, 95(31.6) of the population had adequate knowledge and 59(19.7) population had inadequate knowledge. Data on prevention of domestic accidents show that 130(43.3%) of the population had average knowledge, 123(41%) population had adequate knowledge regarding preventive measures of domestic accident and 47(15.7%) of subjects had inadequate knowledge regarding preventive measures of domestic accident,. Knowledge on domestic accidents seems to have significant association with age of the women, religion of the women, and family’s monthly income of the women.  The present study recommended that there is a need for well planned health educational program about causes of domestic accidents, first aid management, and method of prevention for women, for mothers, caregivers, school teacher and capacity building of village level health workers. As there is a need for injury prevention education for students, the same may be included in the higher school curriculum and college level curriculum.