Assessment of Chemotherapy Safe Handling among Mothers of Children with Cancer at Home

Abstract

Background: Being hazardous, chemotherapy has genotoxicity, carcinogenicity, teratogenicity, organs toxicity, and infertility related exposure harms. Mothers who handle chemotherapy at home may experience such effects due to improper transportation, storage, spillage management, waste disposal and their children’s excreta handling. Aim: This study aimed to assess chemotherapy safe handling among mothers of children with cancer at home. Design, descriptive. This study was conducted at the outpatient and inpatient of pediatric oncology departments in Children Cancer Hospital (57357). Sample: 200 mothers were selected. They administer and handle chemotherapy at home. Tools of data collection included a structured interviewing questionnaire and self-reported checklist sheets for assessing mothers’ knowledge and reported practices. Results: revealed that, 30% of mothers had satisfactory level knowledge, 96.5% of them had poor level of practice. Conclusion: The most of the studied mothers had school education, aged from thirty to less than forty years, were living in urban, had un satisfactory total level of knowledge and poor practice level accompanied by lack of awareness regarding safe handling of chemotherapy. There was a very highly statistically significant correlation between mothers' awareness and each of their total knowledge, reported practices. Meanwhile, there was a statistically significant relation between the studied mothers’ level of education and their total knowledge, also between their age and their total practices. Recommendation: Establish a system of return –back extra -chemotherapy and related -waste to the hospital pharmacy by mothers of children with cancer should be one of the future.