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Left-Behind Children and Risk of Unintentional Injury in Rural China—A Cross-Sectional Survey

Unintentional injury is the leading cause of childhood death and disability in many countries worldwide. This study aimed to quantify rates and risk factors for childhood unintentional injury in areas of rural China, where many children are left behind by migrant worker parents. We administered a qu...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Ma, Sha, Jiang, Minmin, Wang, Feng, Lu, Jingjing, Li, Lu, Hesketh, Therese
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2019
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6388167/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30708979
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph16030403
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author Ma, Sha
Jiang, Minmin
Wang, Feng
Lu, Jingjing
Li, Lu
Hesketh, Therese
author_facet Ma, Sha
Jiang, Minmin
Wang, Feng
Lu, Jingjing
Li, Lu
Hesketh, Therese
author_sort Ma, Sha
collection PubMed
description Unintentional injury is the leading cause of childhood death and disability in many countries worldwide. This study aimed to quantify rates and risk factors for childhood unintentional injury in areas of rural China, where many children are left behind by migrant worker parents. We administered a questionnaire to children aged 9 to 15, in 56 schools in five counties in Zhejiang and Guizhou provinces. Of the 3791 respondents, 44% lived with both parents, 23% with one parent, and 33% with neither. Around half the children (47.9%) had suffered at least one unintentional injury in the past year, with burns (26%), animal bites (20%) and mechanical injury (18%) the most common. Left-behind children had no increased risk of unintentional injury, but children living in poorer Guizhou (p = 0.001), of divorced parents (p = 0.02), and less well-educated mothers (p = 0.02) were associated with higher risk. Virtual absence of personal level risk factors highlights the importance of addressing environmental risk to reduce childhood injury. The findings have informed a community-based intervention to reduce injury risk through raising awareness of environmental hazards, and through removal of specific hazards. Importantly, the Chinese government should ensure that known effective interventions are subject to legislation and enforcement.
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spelling pubmed-63881672019-02-27 Left-Behind Children and Risk of Unintentional Injury in Rural China—A Cross-Sectional Survey Ma, Sha Jiang, Minmin Wang, Feng Lu, Jingjing Li, Lu Hesketh, Therese Int J Environ Res Public Health Article Unintentional injury is the leading cause of childhood death and disability in many countries worldwide. This study aimed to quantify rates and risk factors for childhood unintentional injury in areas of rural China, where many children are left behind by migrant worker parents. We administered a questionnaire to children aged 9 to 15, in 56 schools in five counties in Zhejiang and Guizhou provinces. Of the 3791 respondents, 44% lived with both parents, 23% with one parent, and 33% with neither. Around half the children (47.9%) had suffered at least one unintentional injury in the past year, with burns (26%), animal bites (20%) and mechanical injury (18%) the most common. Left-behind children had no increased risk of unintentional injury, but children living in poorer Guizhou (p = 0.001), of divorced parents (p = 0.02), and less well-educated mothers (p = 0.02) were associated with higher risk. Virtual absence of personal level risk factors highlights the importance of addressing environmental risk to reduce childhood injury. The findings have informed a community-based intervention to reduce injury risk through raising awareness of environmental hazards, and through removal of specific hazards. Importantly, the Chinese government should ensure that known effective interventions are subject to legislation and enforcement. MDPI 2019-01-31 2019-02 /pmc/articles/PMC6388167/ /pubmed/30708979 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph16030403 Text en © 2019 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Ma, Sha
Jiang, Minmin
Wang, Feng
Lu, Jingjing
Li, Lu
Hesketh, Therese
Left-Behind Children and Risk of Unintentional Injury in Rural China—A Cross-Sectional Survey
title Left-Behind Children and Risk of Unintentional Injury in Rural China—A Cross-Sectional Survey
title_full Left-Behind Children and Risk of Unintentional Injury in Rural China—A Cross-Sectional Survey
title_fullStr Left-Behind Children and Risk of Unintentional Injury in Rural China—A Cross-Sectional Survey
title_full_unstemmed Left-Behind Children and Risk of Unintentional Injury in Rural China—A Cross-Sectional Survey
title_short Left-Behind Children and Risk of Unintentional Injury in Rural China—A Cross-Sectional Survey
title_sort left-behind children and risk of unintentional injury in rural china—a cross-sectional survey
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6388167/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30708979
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph16030403
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