Development and Assessment of Maternal and Child Nutrition Education Materials for Health Center Use

Kim, Y J; Ryou, H J; Nam, H J; Min, Y H; Park, H R

Abstract

This study focused on developing and assessing the effectiveness of maternal and child nutrition education materials that can be used conveniently at health centers. Focus group interviews with pregnant women, research of websites for pregnant women, and questionnaire-based surveys on community residents' needs for maternal and child nutrition services were conducted as preliminary study. The focus group interviews were conducted ten times, with five or six women, and the needs assessment was carried out on 884 pregnant or lactating women. The contents of the education materials developed based on the preliminary study were made up of the pregnant women section and the lactating women section. The entire material was composed of lecture materials, guidelines for educators, and handout materials for mothers, in the form of CD and booklets. The lecture materials were made using MS Power Point and the guidelines were wrote specifically, including basic information, main points to the lectures, and lesson plans, so that even non-professionals can easily use them. The effectiveness of the education materials was assessed based on a pretest and posttest method. The reliability of the test instrument was measured by Cronbach alpha, which was 0.75. The results were that the participants' nutrition knowledge scores showed a significant increase(p<0.05) from 3.79+/-0.33 to 3.96+/-0.34, and their attitudes changed positively after the education (p<0.05).