WORLD JOURNAL OF ADVANCE
HEALTHCARE RESEARCH

*Hadeel Waadulah Hassawi, Zainab Anwar Ezzat and Amal Ali Mohammed

ABSTRACT

Background: Diaper dermatitis, often known as diaper rash, is a very common condition among infants. Diaper rash affects the majority of newborns at some point. It can happen at any time when the child is wearing a diaper. The same issue has been observed in older children who are incontinent of urine. It is more frequent in newborns throughout their first 15 months of life, particularly between the 7th and 12th months. Objectives: To find out the prevalence of napkin rash in 6-9 months old infants, to determine clinical types and pattern of management of napkin rash and to identify the factors that might be associated with napkin rash. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted at Al Hamdanyia primary health care center from January 2023 to the end of December 2023. The questionnaire includes three parts; first part: includes general information about the age of infants in months, sex, weight in kg, length in cm. Second part: involves socio-demographic and economic factor of infant’s mothers and fathers which included age of mothers in years, nationality, educational level of mothers and fathers, occupation of mothers and fathers. Third part: includes specific information of infants like type of feeding, presence of chronic disease, presence of other dermatological disorders, presence of oral thrush, use of systemic antibiotics, frequency of bowel motion (times/day), using wet wipes or not, type of soap used in washing and using of adding material. Then the infant is going to be examined for the presence of napkin rash and type of napkin dermatitis. Results: Two hundred fifty infants participated in the study. More than half (53.6%) were females. Sixty eight out of 250 infants (27.2%) had diaper dermatitis. Irritant contact dermatitis represented 50.0% of cases, candida diaper dermatosis in 42.6%, seborrhoeic dermatitis in 5.9%, Jacquest’s erythema in 1.5%. Detailed analysis of risk factors revealed the following significant risk factors: Weight for age > 2Z (P =0.04), diarrhea (P>0.001), oral thrush (P =0.01), other dermatoses (P =0.01), using systemic antibiotics (P =0.02) and unproper use of care additives (P >0.001). Conclusion: Napkin rash is common in 6-9 months old infants. Giving educational lectures and teaching brochures to mothers particularly of those at high risk of napkin dermatitis about better practice and care of nappy skin.