Evaluation of knowledge of parents about safety in transportation of children in vehicles and motorcycles

Objective: To evaluate parents’ knowledge on safe transport of children in motor vehicles and motorcycles. Methods: Cross-sectional study that applied a questionnaire to parents and guardians who were accompanying children in the waiting room for outpatient public and private services. To evaluate knowledge on safe transport of children, the recommendations of the Brazilian Association on Traffic Medicine were used. Data analysis was performed using the chi-square and Mann-Whitney tests for categorical and numerical variables respectively, being significant p<0.05. Results: The sample consisted of 248 parents, 119 from private and 129 public medical services. Among the issues related to motorcycles, 76% of those who usually carry children in this vehicle answered correctly the minimum age allowed for that, however more than 30% of them did not know the safest position to carry children on motorcycles. Considering the automobile transport, the question with the highest percentage of correct answers was about the Endereco para correspondencia: Luiza do Nascimento G. Pereira Avenida Jose Acacio Moreira, 787 – Dehon CEP 88704-900 – Tubarao/SC e-mail: lu_ghizoni@hotmail.com Conflito de interesse: nada a declarar. Recebido em: 10/9/2010 Aprovado em: 28/6/2011