Increasing awareness about the neonatal care of fathers whose babies are hospitalized in neonatal intensive care unit

Abstract

Objective: This research was conducted to determine the efficiency of the training given to the fathers whose babies were hospitalized in the neonatal intensive care unit regarding the improvement of awareness about “Newborn Care” and to develop their awareness about it.
Methods: In this experimental study including pre/post tests and control group, the fathers in the experimental group were given theoretical training and brochures about neonatal care. No training was provided to the fathers in the control group. They were only given visually enriched brochures. The data were collected using a father identification form and an information form including questions to determine the knowledge levels of the fathers level about newborn care. In the analysis of the data, numbers, percentages, distributions, Wilcoxon test for the comparison of pre/post training scores, Mann-Whitney U test for the comparison of two independent groups, and chi-square test for the comparison of socio-demographic characteristics of fathers were used. The significance level was accepted as p < .05. Institutional and ethics committee permissions were obtained for the research.
Results: While pre-training knowledge scores of the fathers in the experimental and control groups were 12.24 ± 12.24 and 12.48 ± 8.46 respectively, their post training scores increased up to 42.98 ± 3.70 and 18.60 ± 6.05 and the difference between them was statistically significant (Z = -6.157, p = .00; Z = -5.297, p = .00). When the experimental and control groups were compared in terms of knowledge scores, while the pre-training scores were found similar, the post training scores in the experimental group were significantly higher than those of the control group (p = .23, p = .00, respectively).
Conclusions: According to these data, the training given to the fathers was found to be effective and their awareness of basic new born care increased.