Digital education–supported telehealth intervention in mothers of children with tracheostomy: A quasi-experimental study

Purpose

The burden of care is high for parents of children with special care needs. Mothers need to be supported in home care to reduce the burden of care. This study aimed to determine the effects of providing digital education–supported telehealth application to mothers of children with tracheostomy receiving home care on the development of complications, hospital admission, care burden, and knowledge level of mothers.

Design and methods

A one-group quasi-experimental, pretest–posttest study. The study was conducted with mothers of children with tracheostomy in the pediatric pulmonology outpatient clinic of a university hospital (n = 37). Digital education–supported telehealth application was provided to mothers. The digitally assisted education intervention lasted 6 weeks. Data were collected using the Child and Mother Identification Form, Complication Development Follow-up Form, Hospital Admission Follow-up Form, Caregiver Burden Scale (CBS), and Tracheostomy Care Knowledge Evaluation Questionnaire. The data were collected at three time points: before, immediately after, and 3 months after the education. For data analysis, repeated-measures analysis of variance and the Shapiro–Wilk, Friedman's, and Cochran's Q tests were used.

Results

In the study, 51% of the mothers were aged between 31 and 40 years; 56% of children were male and 37% were aged ≤3 years. A total of 62% of children aged ≥25 months received respiratory support through home care with tracheostomy and mechanical ventilator. There was no significant difference between the mean number of complications (p = 0.286) and number of hospital admissions (p = 0.079) in the pretest, posttest, and follow-up measurements. The mean CBS score of the mothers decreased in the pretest (36.08 ± 12.04), posttest (33.27 ± 9.58), and follow-up (32.76 ± 11.18) measurements; however, there was no significant difference (p = 0.058). The mean Tracheostomy Care Knowledge Level posttest (13.73 ± 1.28) and follow-up (13.97 ± 1.14) scores increased significantly compared with the pretest (12.14 ± 1.55) scores (p < 0.001).

Conclusions

The digital education–supported telehealth application provided to mothers reduced their care burden and increased their knowledge level. There was no change in the number of complications and hospital admissions.

Practice implications

Digital education–supported telehealth intervention, applied to parents of children requiring special care, is an effective and easy-to-access nursing intervention in reducing the burden of care.