Analysis on the association between the mothers’ knowledge, attitude, practices and the incidence of acute respiratory infection in children under 5 years old in the rural Nam Dinh, Vietnam

Background: The knowledge, attitude and practices of mothers in caring for their children play an important role in prevention of acute respiratory infection. Objectives: The study aimed to identify the association between the mothers’ knowledge, attitude and practices in prevention and caring for children with acute respiratory infection and the incidence of acute respiratory infection in children under 5 years old in the rural Nam Dinh, Vietnam. Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted on 389 among mothers and their children under 5 years old with a simple random sampling technique in rural Nam Dinh, Vietnam from July 2020 to September 2021. Using logistic regression and Odds Ratio (OR) with definition level α=0.05 for analysis of variables Results: Unsatisfactory KAP of mothers in prevention and caring for children with ARI accounted for high percentage. In addition, the incidence of ARI in children under 5 years old remained high at 47.0% (183/389 children). The study revealed the association between the mothers’ attitude, practices and the incidence of ARI in their children. This difference was statistically significant with P< 0.05. Specifically, analysis results showed that mothers' practices are significantly related to the incidence of ARI in children with OR= 2.5; 95%CI= 1.6-3.9 and P< 0.001. Conclusion: The mothers’ knowledge, attitude and practices in prevention and caring for their children with ARI were low. In addition, the incidence of ARI in under-five children was high. There was an association between the mothers’ attitude, practices and the incidence of ARI in children under 5 years old. Moreover, there was a significant association between the mothers’ practices and the incidence of ARI in children