An understanding of mothers' beliefs regarding the causes of illness, treatment, and outcome is an important component of culturally competent care. However, little is known about the beliefs of Asian parents related to acute illnesses. The purpose of our article is to synthesize what is known about the beliefs of mothers regarding the causes, treatment, and outcome of acute illnesses in Asian countries and Hmong in the United States. The literature review covers the period from 1990-2000. The electronic bibliographic databases explored included Pub Med, MEDLINE, HealthSTAR, CINAHL, and PsycINFO. Keywords used were beliefs, health beliefs, mothers or parents, cause of illness or etiology, treatment, diarrhea, acute respiratory infection, measles, Asia, and Hmong. A total of 15 articles were retrieved and examined. Using the matrix method, each article was evaluated according to five frames of reference: journal, purpose, sample, method, and findings. Content analysis was used to generate themes. Expressions of belief related to the causes of illnesses among mothers from Asian countries and Hmong who have emigrated from Laos to the United States of America were found to be quite similar. Beliefs about practices were primarily related to feeding and home care. The majority of mothers first provided treatment for their children using traditional practices. When the child did not recover, the mother sought medical advice.