Abstract

Pratima Koirala* and Apekshya Poudel

ABSTRACT

Ear infections is a collective of infective or inflammatory disorders of the middle ear. These infections account for majority of antibiotic prescriptions and surgery in children. Many of the risk factors for ear infections in children could be modified by adopting proper lifestyle changes which helps in control of ear infections and its complications. Descriptive, cross-sectional research design was used to find out awareness regarding ear infections among mothers of under-5 years children. Total 118 mothers were selected by using non-probability purposive sampling technique from pediatric out-patient department of Chitwan Medical College, Bharatpur-5, Chitwan and data were collected by using structured interview schedule. The data was entered into IBM SPSS version 20 and analysed in terms of descriptive statistics and inferential statistics. Out of 118 respondent, median age was 26 with inter-quartile range of 6. More than half 52.5% of respondent were aware about ear infections whereas less than half 47.5% of respondent were unaware about ear infections. Level of awareness regarding ear infections was significantly associated with ethnicity (p=0.006), religion (p=0.002) and respondent child previous history of ear infections (p= 0.003). Level of awareness plays an important role in the care of a child. Mothers knowledge regarding ear infections plays an important role in bringing down the morbidity caused by it. Lifestyle modification such as avoidance of child exposure to cigarette smoke, vaccinating the child, avoidance of bottle feeding etc can prevent ear infections in children.