Mother’s Health Knowledge & Practice & their Linkage with Childhood Morbidity, Medical Care & Medical Care Expenditure in India

Background: Health knowledge is developed through the experiences gathered by an individual, which makes him or her able to understand health problems. In Indian context, the study assess health knowledge of women of age group 15 to 49 years and its association with the prevalence of short-term morbidities, medical care and medical expenditure among children in age group 0-59 months.
Methods:The health knowledge and practice index and other several variables are constructed based on the information available from nationwide data (IHDS, 2005). Principal Component Analysis (PCA) is used to construct health knowledge index. Binary logistic regression and multinomial logistic regression analysis and MCA are used Results: Though, there is positive impact of education on health, still, immaculate health knowledge is required for mother to understand her child’s health problems. Enhanced health knowledge among mothers’ causes reduction in the prevalence of short-term morbidities among their children. Besides medical care, spending on medical care is also dependent on the fact that, to what extent women rationally take decision on taking care of their children’s health. . Willingness to pay for medical care is guided by their health knowledge. Health knowledge is established as a key determinant of prevalence of child morbidities.