Effect of Family-Centered Education on Promoting Caries Prevention Behaviors in Infants; Case study of Ahvaz City, Iran

Aims: Oral health is an important branch of public health that has a significant impact on individuals' overall health. Despite improved oral health in recent decades, tooth decay is still one of the most common chronic diseases of childhood. This study aimed to investigate the effect of family-centered education on promoting caries prevention behaviors in infants in Ahvaz.Materials and Methods: In this quasi-experimental intervention study, ۱۰۰ mothers of infants aged ۶ months to one year in Ahvaz City, Iran, were selected by cluster random sampling method and randomly assigned to the intervention and control groups. The data collection tool was a researcher-made questionnaire consisting of ۵ areas of demographic characteristics, awareness, attitude, self-efficacy, and performance completed by mothers in three time periods before, one month after, and three months after the educational intervention. The collected data were analyzed using SPSS ۲۲ software and descriptive statistics and Spearman, Mann-Whitney, Friedman, and Wilcoxon correlation tests.Findings: The educational intervention effectively improved the mean scores of mothers' knowledge, attitude, self-efficacy, and performance in the field of caries prevention behaviors in infants and had a statistically significant difference with before the educational intervention (p<۰.۰۵).Conclusion: According to the study's findings, the oral health status of infants and children can be improved with the help of caregivers of health service centers and databases by holding regular and periodic training classes for mothers before the first baby teeth erupt.

کلیدواژه ها:

Early Childhood Caries (ECC) ، Intervention ، Infants ، Mothers