title: The impact of fathers' clubs on child health in rural Haiti.
abstract: In recognition of the important role that fathers play in the lives of young children in Haiti, a public health organization instituted fathers' clubs in 1994 as a strategy to improve the health outcomes of children. Fathers' clubs focus on child and family health education. To evaluate the effectiveness of fathers' clubs, we examined the health of children born in Haitian villages with and without active fathers' clubs and compared results for the two groups. The presence of a fathers' club in a child's birth village had a positive effect on vaccination status, growth monitoring, and vitamin A supplementation after we controlled for socioeconomic status, time, and the quality of the village health agent. Child weights and mortality were not affected by the fathers' clubs.
authors.affiliation: Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing, 525 North Wolfe St., Baltimore, MD 21205, USA. bsloand@son.jhmi.edu
authors.forename: Elizabeth
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Sloand
authors.forename: Nan Marie
authors.initials: NM
authors.lastname: Astone
authors.forename: Bette
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Gebrian
mesh_terms: D046688:Child Mortality; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005220:Fathers; D006205:Haiti / Q000453:epidemiology; D006266:Health Education / Q000379:methods*; D006305:Health Status Indicators; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007224:Infant Care; D007229:Infant Welfare; D008297:Male; D017063:Outcome Assessment, Health Care; D012044:Regression Analysis; D019035:Rural Health Services / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D012944:Social Support