Children Caregivers Knowledge, Attitudes and Practices on Management of Diarrhoea in Children Under the Age of Five Years At Intermediate Hospital Rundu, Kavango East Region, Namibia

Abstract

The prevalence of diarrhoea among rural children remain a big problem for the rural Namibian population, living on the verge of poverty. In most cases diarrhoea denotes to the passage of unformed watery, bloody or mucoid stools three or more than three episodes a day. In most developing and rural countries diarrhoea remain one of the leading cause of death among children underage of five globally.
This study aimed to assess and establish the knowledge, of the children caregivers on home-based management of diarrhoea among children under the age of five at the outpatient department, Intermediate Hospital Rundu, Kavango East Region.
This was a quantitative, descriptive, cross-sectional and analytical designs which employed on 400 caregivers at Intermediate Hospital Rundu Outpatient Department using a systematic sampling method. Knowledge, of caregivers were assessed by means of the five rating Likert’s scaled questionnaires. Data was prepared and entered through SPSS version 29 for analysis. Inferential and descriptive analysis were employed.
The study shows, that out of 400 caregivers, 385 (96.3%) had good level of knowledge, 326 (81.5%) had negative attitudes, while 351(87.7%) had poor level of practice on homebased management of diarrhoea. Age was found to be significantly negatively correlated to the practice (r= -0.191; p<0.001). However, there was no significant correlation between age and attitudes and knowledge (r= -0.008; p<0.879) and (r= -0.019; p<0.710) respectively. In addition, attitude was found to be positively correlated to practice (r= 0.341; p<0.001). Knowledge was found to be positively correlated to the attitude (r= 0.206; p<0.001). Furthermore, the study discovered a significant positive correlation among knowledge and practices of the respondents (r= 0.322; p<0.001). In conclusion, it was recommended that the caregivers should be educated on home-based management of diarrhoea, in order to improve their knowledge, attitudes, and practices on homebased management of diarrhoea in children.