The Impact of Educational Intervention on Jordanian Parents' Knowledge and Attitudes Regarding Children's Antibiotic Use

Abstract

Background: Self-administration of antibiotics is a common health issue that increases antibiotic resistance. Educational interventions can play an important role in tackling the global dilemma of antibiotic resistance, which is aggravated by antibiotic misuse and overuse. For Jordanian parents, better understanding and attitudes toward antibiotic use for their children can lead to more cautious use of these treatments, potentially lowering the risk of antibiotic resistance. Purpose: This study aims to evaluate the effect of educational intervention on parents' knowledge and attitudes regarding children’s antibiotic use. Methods: One-group pre-posttest was used. An adapted questionnaire was used composed of socio-demographic data, parents’ knowledge, and attitudes toward antibiotics. An educational program consisting of a teaching session of 30 minutes covering information about antibiotics and standardized practice to teach community parents about the appropriate use of antibiotics among their children was utilized, where the education session was adopted by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the American Academy of Pediatrics, and a review of many studies that were held in Arabic countries was carried out (Ashour et al., 2022; Magdy et al., 2021; van Buul et al., 2015). The American Academy of Pediatrics and the Jordan Food and Drug Association have reviewed relevant studies with high content validity. Data for this study was collected between March and August 2023. Data was checked for missing and inconsistency. Descriptive statistics of means, frequencies, standard deviations, and percentages were used with categorical and continuous demographics while inferential statistics of the independent t-test were used after checking the normal distribution of data using SPSS, version 25. Results: A total of 150 parents were recruited in this study. Around one-third of the parents were from 18 to 25 years old (n=50, 33.3%). A paired-sample t-test was used to assess the mean difference in parents’ knowledge and practices toward effective usage of antibiotics. It was revealed that introducing an educational program has caused a statistically significant difference that improved parents’ knowledge (t (149) = 10.5, P <0.001). For practice, the educational program showed a significant mean difference before intervention (15.0 ±1.05) and post-intervention (16.9 ±3.53), where (t (149) = 6.02, P <0.001). Conclusion: An educational-program intervention was carried out to raise the study parents’ awareness of antibiotics. Antibiotic-related awareness greatly increased after the educational intervention. Implications for Nursing: Addressing antibiotic misuse and overuse among Jordanian parents through targeted educational interventions necessitates a complex approach that includes healthcare professionals, legislators, educational systems, and the community. Working collaboratively, all of these stakeholders can help reduce antibiotic resistance and keep antibiotics a useful tool for treating bacterial illnesses in children. Keywords: Antibiotics use, Children, Upper respiratory tract infection, Knowledge, Attitudes, Parents, Educational intervention.