KNOWLEDGE ABOUT CARING CHILDREN WITH ACUTE LEUKEMIA OF PRIMARY CAREGIVERS AT NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF HEMATOLOGY AND BLOOD TRANSFUSION

Abstract

Objective: To describe the knowledge about caring of primary caregivers having children with acute leukemia at the National Institute of Hematology and Blood Transfusion. Subject and method: This was analytical-observational research with the design of cross-sectional on 182 primary caregivers having children with acute leukemia at the Blood Diseases Department, Central Institute of Hematology and Blood Transfusion. Results: The satisfactory knowledge of primary caregivers about caring for children with acute leukemia was 70,9%. In which, general knowledge about acute leukemia disease had the largest mean was 11 ± 3,08. For the most part, primary caregivers know about nutritious diet and children need to drink lots of fluids every day. However, there was limited knowledge about caring for children, such as: the percentage of primary caregivers had incorrect answer and didn’t know about the diet for children before chemotherapy were 56% and 23,1% respectively. Primary caregivers did not know the signs of anemia in children (28,6%), didn’t know the cause of the disease (44,5%). Exercises for children were not reasonable with 33,5% primary caregivers said that it was necessary to limit doing daily gentle exercises and 24,7% primary caregivers still allow children to exercise normally when their children had serious blooding and infectious diseases. There were relationships between education, gender and the knowledge about caring children of primary caregivers, with p <0,05. Conclusions: The knowledge of primary caregivers having children with acute leukemia was quite good with 70,9% primary caregivers having satisfactory knowledge. However, the knowledge about the diet for children before chemotherapy, recognition of anemia signs and reasonable exercises for children were low.