Back to Annual Meeting Page		American Public Health Association 133rd Annual Meeting & Exposition December 10-14, 2005 Philadelphia, PA

Abstract #115909

Christina Koulouglioti, MS, RN, PhDc¹, Robert E. Cole, PhD², Harriet J. Kitzman, RN, PhD², Kimberly J. Arcoleo, MPH², and Elizabeth Anson, BA². (1) School of Nursing, University of Rochester, 601 Elmwood Ave, Box SON, Rochester, NY 14642, 585-461-9825, Christina_Koulouglioti@urmc.rochester.edu, (2) School of Nursing, University of Rochester Medical Center, 255 Crittenden Blvd, Rochester, NY 14620

Purpose: To examine the role of child's routines of daily living as a moderator of the relationship between maternal supervision and unintentional injuries. Methods: A descriptive prospective study of 278 mothers and their 3 year-old children. Participants were recruited from 4 pediatric practices in Rochester NY. Child's routines were measured from the Daily Living Routines subscale of the Child Routines Inventory (CRI) and maternal supervision was measured as the number of unsupervised minutes in various environmental situations presenting different levels of risk. Medically attended injuries were obtained via maternal report and medical record abstraction. Poisson analysis was conducted and the number of unintentional injuries was regressed on child's routines, maternal supervision and the interaction of routines to supervision. Results: It was found that routines moderate the relationship between maternal supervision and injuries (estimate of the interaction = -0.005, p<0.05). In the presence of high levels of routines there is no relationship between supervision and injuries. However, in the presence of low levels of routines supervision is positively related to injuries. Children left for a longer period unsupervised sustained more injuries when the environment was unpredictable. Conclusion: These results highlight the complexity of the relationship between maternal supervision and childhood unintentional injuries. Maternal supervision has an impact on injuries only when the environment is unpredictable. An important implication for injury prevention is the design of practical interventions with parents focusing on the structuring of routines and the creation of a predictable environment where supervision is facilitated and injuries prevented.

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