2001 Volume 3 Issue 1 Pages 156-162
Recently, in Japan, the trend towards fewer children has progressed and the family structure has been also changed from a large, multi-generational family to a nuclear family In this situation, the circumstance surrounding,chtld-rearing is forced to change. The purpose of child and maternal health care is to solve problems about childcare for mothers, and support them to rear their children healthy, The aim of this study is to clarify the parental anxiety for and their expectations of Health. Examination for 18-month-old children (HE18). Methods : A questionnaire was sent to 240 mothers of 18 months old babies, who had attended HE18 of one health center between September 1998 and November 1998. Results : The number of mothers who had complained some problems of their childcare was 157 Who had anxieties about their chadren themselves, were more than those about problems (116 versus 41) Almost all (97.5%) attended HE18 in order to confirm whether their children had grown healthy or not. In spite of their anxieties for their child rearing, a lot of them did not expect to solve or consult their problems at HE18, especially within mothers whose problems except their children themselves. Conclusion : Because many mothers think that they could not resolve their anxieties, HE18 should support not only child-rearing but also their mental health dare. However, HE18 could correspond to only some problems about their children themselves. Thus it is expected that the support system for mothers themselves have been rapidly established.
