A new study has found a link between positive parenting and good hand hygiene, and it could help keep everyone healthy as we enter cold and flu season. Most adults know how important it is to make sure they are washing their hands, as it is the best way to keep illnesses and viruses away.
Teaching children to care about hand hygiene can be a bit more difficult, and even though parents and teachers try, they are not always the best at getting all the germs off their hands. They either do not wash them enough, or they don’t wash them long enough.
Work is always being done to see how parents can help teach their child how to properly wash their hands, and we may have an answer. According to Medical Xpress, a study has found that positive parenting on hand hygiene can help reduce the amount of time kindergarten students miss school due to illness.
This study was done by The Education University of Hong Kong, and it can be read in full here.
It has already been known that good hygiene is an effective way to prevent the spread of viruses, but studies have also shown that parents are not well versed in how to teach their children good hand hygiene.
The researchers wanted to know if there was a link between flu infection in parents, and their children. They also wanted to see if hand hygiene interventions were successful in cutting down the amount of time kindergarten students had to spend away from school due to illness.
To complete this study, they looked at 15 randomly selected kindergarten students, and their parents/caregivers. They all participated in a hand-hygiene program. There was a program for children, and one for adults, and they were attended separately.
The parents were then asked to monitor their children for flu symptoms, and they monitored how much time the students had to spend away from school. What they found was that the children who had strong parenting and good hand hygiene had fewer absences from school.
While this may not mean that every parent and child has to take a hand-washing course, but it shows how important it is for parents to make sure they are invested in their child’s hand hygiene, and taking the time to wash them properly. This is the key to keeping children healthy, and in school where they need to be.
Sources: Medical Xpress, SAGE Pub