141st APHA Annual Meeting

In This section

292457
Applying the health belief model to a home safety intervention in an urban environment

Monday, November 4, 2013 : 11:30 AM - 11:50 AM

Eileen McDonald, MS , Johns Hopkins Center for Injury Research and Policy, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD
Wendy C. Shields, MPH , Health Policy and Management, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD
Elise Perry, MHS , Center for Injury Research and Policy, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD
Andrea C. Gielen, ScD, ScM , Center for Injury Research and Policy, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD
Background As part of a large community intervention aimed at improving home safety behaviors (smoke alarm, carbon monoxide (CO) alarm, hot water temperature), a team of investigators composed educational messages based on constructs from the Health Belief Model (HBM). Fire department personnel and safety educators visited urban homes to educate residents about home safety and to install smoke alarms.

Methods HBM constructs (susceptibility, severity, barriers and benefits) were used to guide the development of an assessment tool and a series of messages for use during home visits. After fire department personnel installed alarms; safety educators assessed hot water temperature and presence of CO alarm, and provided education to residents. Educators were trained to use a protocol of key safety messages for each topic area tailor to residents' knowledge and attitudes, assessed through a 19-item questionnaire.

Results Of the 1214 homes visited 709 residents were interested in education from the safety educators. Knowledge varied across topics and individual items. Related to house fires, most (71%) respondents did not know the most common cause of house fires but were more likely (41%) to correct know when fatal fires happen. Most (77%) respondents did not have a fire escape plan and were counseled on the importance and components of fire escape planning. Additional results will be shared about CO and hot water results.

Conclusions HBM was useful in guiding development of safety assessments and messages used in large community intervention trial.

Learning Areas:
Administer health education strategies, interventions and programs
Implementation of health education strategies, interventions and programs
Planning of health education strategies, interventions, and programs

Learning Objectives:
Explain the application of the health belief model to home safety practices Describe the distribution of home safety knowledge among a sample of urban residents

Keywords: Behavior Based Safety, Injury Prevention

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I am a co-investigator of multiple federally funded grants focusing on injury prevention and control and managed a graduate health education training program at a school of public health.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.