Community Nurses’ Knowledge, Attitude, and Practice Towards Child’s Growth and Development Promotion Program in the Community Health Care Center

Abstract

Promoting child growth and development is one of the Indonesian community health center's priority programs. Children's growth and development at early ages play a crucial role in defining children's future health trajectories. This study aims to describe community nurses' knowledge, attitude, and practice towards child growth and development promotion programs in the community health center. A cross-sectional survey was conducted in the Bantul district, Indonesia, involving 73 community health nurses working in the community health center. The sample was recruited using multistage random sampling from 27 community health centers in the Bantul district. Three valid and reliable questionnaires were used to measure nurse's knowledge, attitude, and practice. The Guttman scale knowledge questionnaire consisted of 22 questions. The nurses' attitude and practice questionnaires used a four-point Likert scale and consisted of 23 and 21 questions, respectively. The assessment results were categorised into excellent (scored 75-100%), moderate (scored 56-74%) and poor (scored <56%). The results showed that 71 (97.3%) and 72 (98%) nurses had adequate knowledge and attitude towards child' growth and development promotion programs in public health centers, respectively. Nevertheless, only 45 (62%) of nurses indicated excellent practice towards the implementation of the growth and development promotion program. Among demographic variables measured, only education was associated with nurses' practice (p<0.001). Data from this study indicated that the community nurses might require more training related to the implementation of the health promotion program for children in the community health center to increase their practice and service to promote children's growth and development in the community health center.