Assessment of Nurses' Knowledge and Attitudes toward Fever Management for Children at Assiut Children University Hospital

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Departments of Pediatric Nursing, Faculty of Nursing, Assuit and Sohag Universities

2 Department of Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine, Assuit University

3 Departments of Pediatric Nursing, Faculty of Nursing, Assuit and Sohag Universities ,

Abstract

Fever is one of the most common presenting signs of illness in office based primary care pediatric practice, accounting for 19% to 30% of visits. Fever is also the second most common reason for hospital admission of children. The aim of this study: is to assess nurses' knowledge and attitude toward fever management. Descriptive research design was utilized to meet the aim of this study. Subjects and method: This study was conducted in eertt
units (Gastroenterology Unit, Intermediate and Intensive Care Units ) at Assuit Children University Hospital. The subjects of this study consisted of 73 nurses who were working in the previous units. Two tools were used to collect the required data for this study, tool one: Structured questionnaire sheet for assessment of nurses' knowledge regarding fever and fever management, tool two: Fever management attitude scale (FMA) for assessment of nurses' attitude related to fever and fever management (Walsh et al., 2005). Results: The main results of study demonstrated that 78.1% of studied nurses had unsatisfactory knowledge about fever and fever management. Statistically significant difference was illustrated between nurses place of work and their total percent score of knowledge (p-value =0.021). It was shown that nurses who worked at intensive care unit have satisfactory score of knowledge compared with the nurses who worked at intermediate care unit (34.5% and 23.1% respectively). It was noticed that antipyretic use without doctor order was reported by 43.8% of nurses. Forty six and half percent of nurses (46.5%) had negative attitude toward antipyretics were minimally effective in preventing recurrences. Most nurses (83.6%) disagreed that febrile convulsions do not cause neurological damage. Conclusion: More than three quarters of nurses included in this study had unsatisfactory knowledge about fever and fever management. All nurses have positive attitude toward fever and its management. Recommendations: Carrying out health education programs for all nurses to improve a general knowledge and attitude toward fever and its management.

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