Family support is needed to empower the children with special needs in performing personal hygiene. This study aims to identify the relationship of family support with the ability to do a personal hygiene in children with special needs. Family support includes information support, instrumental support, emotional support and appreciation support. The study design was cross sectional with 84 parents who had children with special needs. The study was conducted by the respondents who filled out a questionnaire was consisting of 3 questionnaires (questionnaire A about characteristics of children with special needs and parental characteristics, questionnaire B about family support and questionnaire C about personal hygiene). The results showed there was no relationship between the characteristics of children with special needs with personal hygiene, there was no relationship between parental characteristics and personal hygiene (p> 0.05). There was a relationship between information support, instrumental support, emotional support and appreciation support with personal hygiene (p <0.005), the most influential support namely appreciation support. In conclusion, there was a significant relationship between information support, instrumental support, emotional support and appreciation support the ability of children with special needs for the personal hygiene. Recommendations in this study carried out research on other personal hygiene and carried out by qualitative methods.

Keywords:

Children with Special Needs, Family Support, Personal Hygiene