Effect of Oral Hygiene Education to Mothers on Stomatitis Induced by Chemical Therapy in Cancer Children: A Quasi-experimental study

Stomatitis is one of the most important acute complications of chemotherapy. Due to the problems and complications of stomatitis, it is very important to prevent it during chemotherapy. The aim of this research was to determine the effect of oral hygiene education to mothers on chemotherapy-induced stomatitis in children with cancer.

This quasi-experimental study performed on 69 mothers of children with cancer undergoing chemotherapy hospitalized in a pediatric oncology ward. All mothers were randomly divided into two experimental and control groups. Oral hygiene education was face to face. The severity of stomatitis was assessed using the WHO checklist once at the first day of intervention and then on the seventh and fourteenth day after intervention in both groups. The data were analyzed using Mann-Whitney, Chi-square and t-test.

The mean degree of stomatitis on the seventh and fourteenth days after the intervention was 0.71 ± 0.52 and 0.32 ± 0.63 in the experimental group and 1.46 ± 0.61 and 2.74 ± 0.92 in the control group, respectively. There was a statistically significant difference between severity stomatitis after education to mothers in the two groups (P = 0.001).

Oral hygiene education to mothers has an effect on the severity of chemotherapy-induced stomatitis in children with cancer and reduces it on the seventh and fourteenth days after the intervention. It is necessary for nurses to check the oral hygiene status of these children and the severity of stomatitis every day.