Validity of maternal report of care-seeking for childhood illness.
J Glob Health
; 8(1): 010602, 2018 Jun.
Article
em En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-29619212
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND:
Accurate data on care-seeking for child illness are needed to improve public health programs and reduce child mortality. The accuracy of maternal report of care-seeking for child illness as collected through household surveys has not been validated.METHODS:
A 2016 survey compared reported care-seeking against a gold-standard of health care provider documented care-seeking events among a random sample of mothers of children <5 years in Southern Province, Zambia. Enrolled children were assigned cards with unique barcodes. Seventy-five health care providers were given smartphones with a barcode reader and instructed to scan the cards of participating children seeking care at the source, generating an electronic record of the care-seeking event. Additionally, providers gave all caregivers accessing care for a child <5 years provider-specific tokens used to verify the point of care during the household survey. Reported care-seeking events were ascertained in each household using a questionnaire modeled off the Zambia Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) / Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS). The accuracy of maternal report of care-seeking behavior was estimated by comparing care-seeking events reported by mothers against provider-documented events.RESULTS:
Data were collected on 384 children with fever, diarrhea, and/or symptoms of ARI in the preceding 2 weeks. Most children sought care from government facilities or community-based agents (CBAs). We found high sensitivity (Rural 0.91, 95% confidence interval CI 0.84-0.95; Urban 0.98, 95% CI 0.92-0.99) and reasonable specificity (Rural 0.71, 95% CI 0.57-0.82; Urban 0.76, 95% CI 0.62-0.85) of maternal report of care-seeking for child illness by type of provider. Maternal report of any care-seeking and seeking care from a skilled provider had slightly higher sensitivity and specificity. Seeking care from a traditional practitioner was associated with lower odds of accurately reporting the event, while seeking care from a government provider was associated with greater odds of accurate report. The measure resulted in a slight overestimation of true care-seeking behavior in the study population.CONCLUSIONS:
Maternal report is a valid measure of care-seeking for child illness in settings with high utilization of public sector providers. The study findings were limited by the low diversity in care-seeking practices for child illness and the exclusion of shops.
Texto completo:
1
Coleções:
01-internacional
Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Assunto principal:
Infecções Respiratórias
/
Aceitação pelo Paciente de Cuidados de Saúde
/
Serviços de Saúde da Criança
/
Pesquisas sobre Atenção à Saúde
/
Diarreia
/
Febre
/
Mães
Tipo de estudo:
Prognostic_studies
/
Qualitative_research
Limite:
Adolescent
/
Adult
/
Child, preschool
/
Female
/
Humans
/
Infant
/
Male
/
Newborn
País/Região como assunto:
Africa
Idioma:
En
Revista:
J Glob Health
Ano de publicação:
2018
Tipo de documento:
Article
País de afiliação:
Estados Unidos