Background: Parents have a strong influence on their children’s well being and behavior and are responsible for ensuring the health of their children. Parental health literacy skills have been linked to health behaviors that impact on children’s health. The objective of this study was to assess parental health literacy and numeracy skills for caring for preschool children in Tehran city.
 Method: We performed a Descriptive study of parents of preschool children (3-6year-old children) in selected preschool centers in Tehran to assess parental health literacy and numeracy skills for caring for preschool children. Participants in the study were 357 parents from preschool centers. The children of these caregivers ranged in age from three to six. Participants were given the following survey instruments: 1) a demographic questionnaire to assess basic patient characteristics, 2) a previously validated preschool parent`s health literacy measure that consists of 40 questions in five domains: Nutrition, Psychosocial/Development, Injury/Safety, numeracy skills, and health information. All analyses were performed by SPSS v.18 software. the scores on the preschool parents health literacy was compared by Student t tests or 1-way analysis of variance.
Results: The majority of participants were mothers (77/6%). the participants were in the 21-51 year age range with a mean age of 33.43 years (SD =5/16) Based on data analysis mother`s total health literacy scores was 67/6± 13/2 that is further than father`s total health literacy scores61/7 ±16/4. based on Student t tests mothers health literacy in nutrition, Psychosocial/Development and health information domains and total scores was further than fathers (p<0/05). Higher performance on the questionnaire was significantly correlated (p<0/05) with education. It also shows that parents who had child care books at home and parents who used internet to search health information had higher health literacy.
Conclusion: Parents health literacy was about marginal. By enhancing family parents education level, their health literacy level increases. Having books about child care at home and parents health information search not only is an indicator of their responsibility but also indicates their higher health literacy.