The aim of this study was to investigate the extent to which parents follow advice from child health nurses about child accident prevention. The study was performed in one of the 10 districts in the city of Malmö, Sweden. Parents to 90, 10-month old children in southern Sweden participated. These parents completed a questionnaire that prompted responses related to parents' background and socio-economic factors as well as questions about any precautions they have taken to decrease hazards to children in their home. Odds ratios, confidence intervals and multiple logistic regression analysis was performed. The results indicated that lower educated parents (i.e. those with 12 years' education or less) and foreign-born parents complied with a significantly lower level. These results support the need to increase efforts in child accident prevention work. It is important for child health nurses to concentrate their efforts on foreign parents and on less educated parents. Information should be relayed regularly to these parents in a motivational way, in order to decrease risks of child accidents at home.

The aim of this study was to describe characteristics in burn injuries in children (zero to six years old), consulting primary care and hospital-based care in Malmö, Sweden. Burn-injured children consulting the University Hospital or the 21 Health Centres, during year 1998 and year 2002, were included. Background. Epidemiological studies of burns in children have mostly been hospital-based and the cases that never reached the hospital have been excluded. Design. The study had a retroperspective design with data collected from medical records. Methods. Chi-squared test was used to analyse differences in nominal data and cross tables were used to analyse the proportions between the characteristics of the injuries and sex, age and nationality. Results. The burn-injured children were 148 and 80% of those were scalds, caused by hot liquid (71%) or hot food (29%). The greatest number was boys between one and two years old. Children to foreign born parents were more frequently affected and the extent of the injuries often larger. Almost all the accidents (96%) occurred in home environment, while a family member was next to the child. The Health Centres received more often children affected on hand/arm and by causes like hot food than the University Hospital. Conclusions. Our data demonstrate the importance of developing a programme for the prevention of paediatric scalds with education of family members to be aware of the danger. With present study the knowledge about the occurrence of injuries in scald accidents in children has become deeper. This knowledge may contribute to more individual adept child accident prevention programme, to use in the child health care.

Flertalet skador som drabbar små barn sker i hemmet. Därför syftade denna studie till att undersöka om utvidgad individuell information till mödrar avseende skador bland barn i hemmet och möjliga preventiva åtgärder har någon effekt på deras medvetenhet kring problemet och om känslan av sammanhang har någon inverkan. Denna studie var designad som en kvasi-experimentell interventionsstudien med en jämförelsegrupp. Utvidgad individuell information med empowerment som förhållningssätt användes. Nittionio mödrar med barn under 7 månader deltog. Ett frågeformulär med sociodemografiska data och frågor angående medvetenhet om prevention användes. Mödrar som deltog i interventionen ökade signifikant sin medvetenhet kring att skador bland barn händer i hemmet jämfört med mödrar i jämförelsegruppen [OR 2.3, CI 1.3-4.3]. Å andra sidan fann studien ingen signifikant förbättring avseende medvetenhet kring prevention, ej heller någon association till mödrarnas känsla av sammanhang. Denna studie visade att interventionen hade en positiv effekt på mödrarnas medvetenhet angående att skador bland barn sker i hemmet, men ökade inte mödrarnas medvetenhet angående att förebygga skador.

Most injuries to young children happen in the home. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate if extended individual information to mothers´ related to injury to children in the home and possible preventative actions has any effect on their awareness of the problem and if Sense of Coherence has any influence. This was a quasi-experimental designed intervention study with a comparison group. Extended individual information with empowerment as the approach was used. Ninety-nine mothers of children under the age of 7 months participated. A questionnaire with sociodemographic data and questions regarding awareness towards prevention was used. Mothers who took part in the intervention significantly increased their awareness of the fact that child injuries take place at home when compared with the mothers in the comparison group, [OR 2.3, CI 1.3-4.3]. However, no significant improvement of awareness towards prevention was noted, neither any association to the mothers SOC-scores. This study showed that the intervention had a positive effect on the mothers´ awareness towards the fact that child injuries are taking place at home, but it did not increase the mothers´ awareness towards prevention of child injury.

AIM: The aim of this study was to investigate to what extent individual-based extended information given to mothers from city parts of low education can improve precautions taken by them to prevent burn and scald injuries involving young children in the home and further to compare the results with a group of mothers who had not received extended information. METHODS: This intervention study, with a comparison group, has a quasi-experimental design. Individual-based information, with an empowerment approach, was given to a group of mothers living in two separate areas of a city in southern Sweden with a low level of education. In total, 99 mothers of children under the age of 7 months participated. The mothers were selected through the local child healthcare authorities. Observations were made and bivariate analyses were established. RESULTS: The results showed that the intervention had a significant impact on improving the precautions the participating mothers introduced to protect their children against burn and scald injuries in the home and further, in relation to a comparison group. CONCLUSIONS: Through empowerment, workshops, and home visits aimed to increase their consciousness and knowledge, the participating mothers' precautions taken against child injuries in the home improved. It is of great importance that a framework for considering the problem of burn and scald injuries to children is presented from a preventive perspective which, in combination with evidence-based interventions, may enable the creation of injury prevention programmes for implementation by the community health care.