Children road safety and Primary Care

Objective: The research of children and parent´s attitudes and knowledges in the matter of road security. Material and method: A descriptive research using a questionary prepared by the authors and filled by means of a personal interview to children and parents who assisted in ?The healthy child´s control? that took place during the months January-June , 1998. Collected variables: a) The use of a fastening system located inside the car. b) The use of the safety belt. c) The use of the crash helmet. d) The knowledge of the minimum rules related to road security. e) The different procedures of getting the information. Results: We carried out 337 polls to children from ages ranging between 1 month and 14 years (average age 4,6). 54,9% are boys and 45,1% girls. 165 are under 3 ages. The 66,7% (59,64-73,76%, p?95%) make use of a suitable chair according to their weight.172 are over 3 and out of these only the 10,5% make use of the fastening system. The 89,2% (85,72-92,68%) of the parents use the safety belt. The 72,4% (68,58-76,22%) advise their children about the use of it, but it is only the 48,1% who make use of it (43,35-52,85%). The 93,1% (92,11-94,09%) of the children don´t use the crash helmet. The 90,6% (86,35- 94,85%) of the children over 4 know the minimum rules of road security. They got the information throught their parents (85,2%) school (50,3%) the health center (15,5%) and the mass media (5%). Concluding: a) Fastening systems aren´t frequently used. b) The use of crash helmet is not deeply rooted in our population. c) We must make an effort from the health centers to improve the information for the population in the matter of road security.