OBJECTIVETo evaluate the effectiveness of parental education on reducing lead exposure of children by examining the changes in blood lead levels of children whose parents receiving or not receiving educational intervention.

METHODSTwo hundred children with confirmed blood lead levels beyond 100 microg/L were selected. They were randomized into two groups, 107 children in study group and 93 in control. At the beginning of the study, parents of both study and control groups were called for interview to complete KABP questionnaire and lead study questionnaire. The study group was provided with interventional measures while control group was not contacted until the end of study. Intervention of parental education was undertaken by means of a TV program, a set of slides and a brochure, and focused on the questions regarding harmful effects of lead poisoning, the sources of environmental lead and prevention of this preventable disease. Tests for blood lead level were repeated for both study and control groups 3 months after the determination of the initial blood lead level.

RESULTSAll the relevant knowledge of health effect, lead sources and prevention of childhood lead poisoning of participating parents of study group were improved significantly (chi(2) = 14.06, 13.07, 10.08, 28.26, P < 0.01) after educational intervention while parents control group also were significantly improved in the sub-catalogs of concept and prevention (chi(2) = 7.69, 8.64, P < 0.01), but not the health effect and sources of childhood lead poisoning. Children and parents' behavior in study group was improved accordingly and significantly. Less children ate popcorn (chi(2) = 4.08, P < 0.05), less children drank tap-water in the morning (chi(2) = 23.04, P < 0.01), more kids washed their hands before eating (chi(2) = 5.82, P < 0.05), less kids played on road side (chi(2) = 9.60, P < 0.01), and more parents changed their coat or took shower or washed hands before going home after work (chi(2) = 4.00, P < 0.05). But in the control group only the number of kids playing on road side was decreased significantly (chi(2) = 9.60, P < 0.01). A general decline in blood lead levels was detected in both groups with statistical significance at P < 0.01. However, the decrease in blood lead levels was more remarkable in the study group. There was average reduction of 55 microg/L (35%) in blood lead levels for study group (t = 4.979, P < 0.01) and an almost 33 microg/L (20%) for control (t = 3.398, P < 0.01). The reduction in blood lead level was 22 microg/L greater in study group (t = 3.531, P < 0.01). The study also showed that the effectiveness of the educational interventions depended upon various aspects. Fourteen variables were included in the stepwise multiple regression equation of blood lead level changes. Such as parents' occupational exposure to lead, the improvement of knowledge about prevention of childhood lead poisoning, the chang of habit of snacks intake, parents' education levels, the change of attitude of parents for the childhood lead poisoning, etc.

CONCLUSIONEducating parents is proved to be an effective approach for children with mild and moderate lead poisoning.

Child ; Environmental Exposure ; Health Behavior ; Health Education ; Humans ; Lead ; blood ; Lead Poisoning ; blood ; therapy ; Parents ; education

Adolescent ; Asthma ; psychology ; therapy ; Behavior Therapy ; Child ; Female ; Health Education ; Humans ; Male ; Massage ; Psychotherapy

PURPOSE: This purpose of this study was to examine the effects of a rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT) counseling program on self-efficacy and adjustment to college life for nursing freshmen. METHODS: This study used a nonequivalent control pretest-posttest quasi-experimental design. Thirty-eight new nursing students were randomly assigned to either an experimental group (n=18) or a control group (n=20) recruited from a four-year nursing college. An REBT counseling program was composed of 8 group sessions of orientation, understanding the theory of REBT, finding irrational beliefs, internalizing rational beliefs, and closing over a duration of 5 weeks. The duration of each session was 90 minutes. Self-efficacy and adjustment to school life were measured by the Sherer's Self-Efficacy Scale and Baker & Siryk's Student Adjustment to College before and after the REBT counseling program. Data were analyzed using t-tests and paired t-tests. RESULTS: The experimental group showed a significant improvement in self-efficacy compared to the control group. There was no significant change in college life adjustment between the experimental and control groups. CONCLUSION: An REBT counseling program could be applied as an effective program in enhancing self-efficacy resulting in positive and goal-oriented behavior for new nursing students in college.
Behavior Therapy* ; Cognitive Therapy ; Counseling* ; Education, Nursing ; Humans ; Nursing* ; Self Efficacy ; Students, Nursing

OBJECTIVES: Clinical symptoms and related psychological problems in children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are associated with low self-control and problematic interpersonal relationship between family members. A therapeutic narrative treatment based on "Treating Huckleberry Finn" by David Nylund was reported to be effective in reduction of individual or family conflicts. We hypothesized that therapeutic narrative treatment would improve self-control and parent-child relational problems. METHODS: Sixteen children who were diagnosed as ADHD participated in the current study. They were classified according to two groups, narrative treatment group and medication treatment group. The narrative treatment group (NTG) was asked to participate in 6 weeks combined therapy of medication and 11 sessions of narrative therapeutic treatment. The medication group (MG) was asked to participate in 6 weeks combined therapy of medication and education for behavior controls in ADHD children. RESULTS: During the 6-week treatment period, the clinical symptoms in NTG improved at a trend level, compared to MG [F(1,16)=4.32, p=0.054]. During the 6-week treatment period, the sub-scale of respecting for children in parent-child interaction scores [F(1,16)=8.65, p=0.010] and self-control scores [F(1.16)=3.78, p<0.01] in NTG improved significantly, compared to MG. CONCLUSION: Based on the current results, therapeutic narrative treatment can be a complementary trial for improving self-control and parent-child interaction in children with ADHD.
Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity* ; Behavior Control ; Child* ; Education ; Family Conflict ; Huckleberry Plant ; Humans ; Narrative Therapy*

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to investigate the trends and the effects of intervention related to ADHD children by meta-analysis. METHODS: After review of 200 articles released from 1990 to 2009 from RISS, KISS, and DBpia, 26 studies was conducted to determine methodological data, 362 research variables, using SPSS/WIN 17.0 program. RESULTS: Effects size of overall intervention is 1.32 which is high level in terms of Cohen criteria. The greatest effect of intervention is obtained from cognitive behavior control training (1.79). Also art therapy (1.29) and social skill training (0.97) are highly effective whereas parents education (0.66) is only moderate effective. Duration of each session and numbers of session are influential in cognitive behavior control and social skills training. CONCLUSION: The results reveal that ADHD intervention has large effect sizes for core features and peripheral features of target outcome variables. For improving the reliability of the meta-analysis results by minimizing publication bias, more intervention studies using appropriated study design should be done.
Art Therapy ; Behavior Control ; Child* ; Education ; Humans ; Clinical Trial ; Parents ; Publication Bias

This study was conducted to investigate nutrient intakes and obesity-related factors of obese children by interviewing the subjects aged from 11 to 13 in Daegu. The collected data were consisted of items on general characteristics, dietary behavior, nutrition knowledge and daily nutrient intakes of subjects. The subjects were classified into obese and non-obese control groups according to their relative weights. Frequency of skipping breakfast and eating rate of obese group were significantly higher than those of control group. There was no significant difference between obese and control group in the nutrition knowledge score. Except vitamins B1, B2 and iron, the average daily intakes of other nutrients in obese were greater than control group. The most contributing factor to BMI turned out to be cholesterol intake. After the nutrition education targeting obese children, their nutrition knowledge scores improved, but the dietary behavior score was not significantly changed. Therefore, childhood obesity may be prevented by continuous education programs including the behavior modification of obese children.
Behavior Therapy ; Breakfast ; Child* ; Cholesterol ; Daegu ; Eating ; Education* ; Humans ; Iron ; Pediatric Obesity ; Vitamins ; Weights and Measures

PURPOSE: This study was conducted to investigate sexual behaviors and influencing factors affecting premenopausal women who have breast cancer and have undergone surgery. METHODS: Seventy premenopausal women, ranging between 35~55 years of age, were included in this study. Sexual behaviors were evaluated using the WSBQ-F (Wilmoth Sexual Behaviors Questionnaire-Female). The in-depth interview was analyzed utilizing content analysis. RESULTS: There were no significant differences regarding the type of surgery, age, time of marriage, education level, occupation, chemotherapy, use of Tamoxifen, and radiotherapy in the sexual activities of premenopausal women with breast cancer. However, quality-related information utilizing qualitative in-depth interviews, revealed 3 issues regarding sexual behaviors.. Participants reported physical discomfort such as vaginal dryness, dyspareunia, emotional changes such as decrease in sexual confidence, and interaction-related changes such as mandatory sexual life, sexual intimacy with one's partner, and being more active sexual behaviors. CONCLUSION: There were complex changes associated with sexual behavior after surgery for women with breast cancer which included various events related to stress regarding sexual behavior. Communication between women with breast cancer, their partners, and medical caregivers has a ability to maximize the sense of sexual wellbeing while minimizing the sexual crises.
Breast Neoplasms* ; Breast* ; Caregivers ; Drug Therapy ; Dyspareunia ; Education ; Female ; Humans ; Marriage ; Occupations ; Radiotherapy ; Sexual Behavior* ; Tamoxifen

OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this study was to develop web-based self-nutrition management u-Health program for diabetic patients (DMDMG: Diabetes Mellitus Dietary Management Guide) for achieving systematic self-management of diet. METHODS: The program consisted of five parts with different contents according to the results of needs assessment. Five major parts were 1) meal management part which contains calorie prescription, meals recording and dietary assessment, 2) prevention of disease part with information of diabetes and assessment of dietary behavior, 3) dietary behavior modification part with an education on dietary behavior modification plan and dietary behavior plan, 4) meal plan containing a training section for meal plan and self constructing part for meal planning by making tables, and 5) information about myself which composed with general and physical information. The system proposed in this study provides nutrients intake results right after input of diet intake, which is possible with simultaneous calculation of input data in the server with 3,495 food and 1,821 meal data base. The nutrients analysis program was evaluated with 26 diabetic patients with two-day 24 hr recall. RESULTS: The differences of nutrients intakes between DMDMG and CANPRO 3.0 ranged from 13.5-16.5%, which was caused by the differences of databases of the two programs. The characteristics of DMDMG were; 1) it can provide an interactive tailored nutrition management, 2) it is a practical tool of diabetes nutritional management, 3) the program gives motivation for the dietary behavior modification. CONCLUSIONS: The effectiveness of whole program needs to be conducted, but the program was an innovative tool for self-management of nutrient intakes, diet behaviors, meal management and tailored nutrition education.
Behavior Therapy ; Diabetes Mellitus ; Diet ; Education ; Humans ; Meals ; Motivation ; Needs Assessment ; Prescriptions ; Self Care

PURPOSE: This study was a systematic review and meta-analysis designed to investigate effects of psychoeducational intervention for cancer survivors. METHODS: Ten databases were searched. Two reviewers independently performed the selection of the studies, data extraction and assessment. The risk of bias was assessed using Cochrane Collaboration's tool. To estimate the effect size, meta-analysis of the studies was performed using Comprehensive Meta-Analysis and RevMan programs. RESULTS: Of 18,781 publications identified, 35 met inclusion criteria, and 25 studies were used to estimate effect size of psychoeducational intervention. Effect sizes (standardized mean difference [SMD]) were heterogeneous and random effects models were used in the analyses. Psychoeducational intervention was effective for quality of life (n=2,410, ES=0.23; 95% CI: 0.09~0.37), coping and self-efficacy (n=179, ES=0.68; 95% CI: 0.26~1.11), anxiety (n=1,786, ES=-0.26; 95% CI: -0.37~-0.15), depression (n=1,910, ES=-0.28; 95% CI: -0.37~-0.18), and psychological distress (n=2,242, ES=-0.31; 95% CI: -0.46~-0.17). Subgroup analysis showed that counseling was the most effective intervention for quality of life, and behavioral therapy was an effective intervention for all positive and negative outcomes. Publication bias was not detected except for psychological distress. CONCLUSION: Psychoeducational intervention appears to be effective in improving quality of life and coping and self-efficacy, and it is effective in reducing psychological symptoms in cancer survivors. Behavioral therapy, especially, is commonly effective in improving psychosocial outcomes. However, low-quality evidence, variability in the designs of existing studies, and publication bias suggest that additional high-quality trials should be conducted in the future.
Anxiety ; Behavior Therapy ; Bias (Epidemiology) ; Counseling ; Depression ; Education ; Humans ; Publication Bias ; Quality of Life ; Survivors*

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to identify effects of an obesity control program including rhythmical dance exercise, on body composition, knowledge about obesity, life habits and self-esteem among obese elementary school children. This program included obesity related health education and counseling based on behavior modification once a week, 1 hour-rhythmical dance class once a week and 40-minute jump rope classes twice a week for 8 weeks. METHOD: There were 29 students with obesity in the experimental and 28 in the control group. Participated was voluntary. The data were collected from April 16 to July 6 2007. chi-square-test, Fisher's exact test, paired t-test and t-test were used to analyze the data. RESULTS: Students in the experimental group showed significantly lower fat mass (t=-2.16, p=.036) and percent body fat (t=-2.93, p=.005) and significantly higher muscle mass (t=2.05, p=.045) and lean body mass (t=2.71, p=.009) than those in the control group. Knowledge of obesity increased significantly and eating habits changed significantly. But difference in exercise habits and self-esteem were not significant. CONCLUSION: This study provides evidence that an 8 week-obesity control program including rhythmical dance exercise is effective in decreasing body fat, increasing muscle mass and increasing knowledge of obesity in children who are obese.
Adipose Tissue ; Behavior Therapy ; Body Composition ; Child ; Counseling ; Eating ; Health Education ; Humans ; Muscles ; Obesity