Nurse-led and nurse-involved interventions to support child growth and development in low- and middle-income countries: a scoping review

Nurfiana Nurfiana(1), Ferika Indarwati(2*)


(1) Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta
(2) Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta
(*) Corresponding Author

Abstract


Monitoring child growth and development is essential, particularly in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) facing healthcare access and nutritional challenges. Nurses play an important role in promoting child development through monitoring, education, stimulation, and family empowerment. This scoping review aimed to map the types, characteristics, implementation methods, and outcomes of nurse-led or nurse-involved interventions supporting child growth and development in LMICs. The review followed the PRISMA Extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR) guidelines. Articles published between 2021 and 2026 were retrieved from PubMed, ScienceDirect, and Google Scholar. Of 771 records identified, six studies from Brazil, Rwanda, Bangladesh, and Indonesia met the inclusion criteria. Interventions included nurse-led home visits, mobile health (mHealth)-based growth monitoring, health education, family-based nursing, and telenursing. Reported outcomes included improvements in expressive language development, growth monitoring documentation, nutritional indicators, parental knowledge, stimulation skills, and maternal confidence. However, improvements in child growth and developmental outcomes were not consistently demonstrated across studies. These findings suggest that nurse-led and nurse-involved interventions may support child growth and development through integrated child-, family-, technology-, and community-centered approaches. Further research using rigorous study designs, larger samples, longer follow-up periods, and standardized outcome measurements is needed to establish their effectiveness.

Keywords


child growth and development; low- and middle-income countries (LMICs); nursing interventions; scoping review; telenursing

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.26714/mki.9.4.2026.392-409

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