Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the health education needs of mothers who are nurturing children with disabilities.
Method: A descriptive study was done and the participants were 108 mothers of children with disabilities such being mentally challenged, developmentally delayed or having a disability involving brain damage. The questionnaire was a health education need assessment with 11 categories(58 items) developed by Han et al. The data were analyzed using SPSS program.
Results: The mean score for health education needs of the mothers of children with disabilities was 3.83 (SD=0.58) out of a maximum 5. The health education need for acquisition of knowledge and information had the highest score (4.40±0.54) followed by health education needs for cognitive development and learning (4.31±0.64), interpersonal relationships (4.04±0.65) and behavior and emotion (4.04±0.79). There were significant differences between the children’’s sex (t=2.08, p=.04), birth order (t=2.17, p=.03), grade of disability (F=3.32, p=.02) and sex education suitable to the child’’s in age.
Conclusion: The health education needs of mothers of children who are disabled were very high and varied. Therefore, it was important to develop comprehensive education programs which include this content and provide opportunities for mothers of children with disabilities to receive this education.
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