The effects of home safety intervention on guardians’ behaviors of injury prevention in injured children: a double blind randomized controlled study

Purpose The optimal time for home safety intervention for children’s injury prevention is during the injury-related visits to emergency departments. The authors investigated the effect of home safety equipment provision on the guardians’ perception of injury prevention and attitude toward it, and the use of home safety equipment. Methods We conducted a double blind randomized controlled study on guardians of children aged 7 years or younger who visited the emergency department with accidental injuries. After completing the structured, pre-intervention survey on home safety, the guardians were randomly assigned to receive either home safety equipment (the intervention group) or stationery (the control group) in the same opaque boxes enclosing pamphlets about home safety education. After 4 weeks, the guardians were contacted for the post-intervention survey. The questionnaires for the latter survey consisted of the same contents with 2 added questions regarding the use of new home safety equipment after intervention. Logistic regressions were conducted to identify factors associated with the outcome (i.e., behavioral change). Results From April through October 2019, we approached 972 guardians. Of these, 59 guardians answered both pre- and post-intervention surveys. No differences were found in the perception and attitude, and use of home safety equipment between the intervention and control groups at the pre- and post-intervention surveys. No variables were associated with the primary outcome. Conclusion Provision of home safety equipment may be inadequate to improve guardians’ behaviors about prevention of domestic injuries