Empowering Mothers through the Utilization of Maternal and Child Health Handbooks in Preventing Child Growth and Development Problems

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-571-3_32How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Growth and Development; Maternal and Child Health Handbooks; Mother Empowerment

Abstract

Child development problems are still a crucial public health problem in Indonesia. Maternal and Child Health (MCH) handbook is one of the important instruments that can be utilized by mothers to detect early and prevent various child growth and development problems such as stunting, underweight and wasting. To support the improvement of health quality, mothers need to be facilitated and empowered to be able to own, understand and use the MCH Handbook effectively. This article aimed to assess the effectiveness of the MCH Handbook in preventing child development problems and explore how maternal empowerment supports its optimal use. This research used the narrative literature review method by analyzing articles published in the last five years related to the use of MCH Handbook, child growth and development, and maternal empowerment. Literature analysis was conducted after collecting articles through several databases such as Science Direct, Google Scholar and PubMed. The results showed that empowering mothers through education, cadre training, and maternal-child classes increase active use of the MCH Handbook. Active users are better at identifying developmental delays and taking early preventive action. The effectiveness of MCH Handbook utilization is influenced by health literacy, understanding the contents of the handbook, and maternal involvement in educational activities. Beyond monitoring growth and development, the MCH Handbook serves as a tool to empower mothers in preventing avoidable child mortality. Strengthening education, simulation and mentoring systems in utilizing the MCH Handbook is needed to support early prevention of child growth and development disorders and strengthen human security in the family and surrounding community.

Copyright

© 2026 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Lama’ah Azzahra’
AU  - Nyoman Anita Damayanti
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/05/06
TI  - Empowering Mothers through the Utilization of Maternal and Child Health Handbooks in Preventing Child Growth and Development Problems
BT  - Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Multidisciplinary Studies 2025 (ICOMSI 2025)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 380
EP  - 392
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-571-3_32
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-571-3_32
ID  - Azzahra’2026
ER  -