Background: Birth companions have been shown to improve quality of care provided to laboring women. Various studies have shown the benefits of companion during child birth. The objective of this study was to assess the knowledge, attitude and practice of health care providers towards the involvement of birth companions during child birth in St Paul’s Hospital Millennium Medical College (SPHMMC) and its selected catchment health centers. Methods: The study used a cross-sectional study which was supplemented by qualitative study design which employed phenomenological design was conducted using in depth interview of health care providers who were on practice during the study period in SPHMMC. Result: The study included a total 58 health care providers. The finding from the study showed that great proportion of health care providers involved in the study (90 %) have positive attitude towards involvement of birth companions but majority 82.4 % didn’t allow birth companions. The commonest reasons mentioned for not involving companions include fear of breach of privacy, interference with routine medical care and risk of litigation/complaints.Conclusion and Recommendation: The findings from this study showed that majority of the health care providers are against the practice of involving birth companions. Since involvement of birth companions is one way to ensure the quality of care provided there should be an effort to increase the knowledge of health professionals on benefits of birth companions. There is also a need for improvement of the work setup. Simple measures like providing screens, providing separate rooms for laboring and post-partum women will have a significant impact on the quality of care provided.

Background: Birth companion refers to a person who provides support to laboring women during child birth. Various studies have shown the benefits of birth companions. The objective of this study was to assess the attitude of mothers towards the involvement of birth companions during child birth at St Paul’s Hospital Millennium Medical College (SPHMMC) and its selected catchment health centers. Methodology: The study used a cross-sectional study to determine the perception of postpartum mothers on the involvement of birth companions during child birth. Result: The study included a total of 393 postpartum women. The finding from the study showed majority of the post-partum women (98.7%) were not allowed to have companions during labor. Among postpartum women 27.3 % has negative attitude towards involvement of birth companions. The commonest reasons mentioned by post-partum women for having negative attitude to this practice included need for privacy, religious values and fear of overburdening family members with stress. Conclusion: The findings from this study showed that majority of women were denied the option of having a birth companion. The study has also shown the desire to have birth companion isn’t universal among laboring women in our setup. There is a need to understand the socio-cultural values of the community before embarking on widespread implementation of involvement of birth companions.

Introduction: Birth companions have been shown to improve quality of care provided to laboring women. Various studies have shown the benefits of companion during child birth. The objective of this study was to assess the knowledge, attitude and practice of health care providers towards the involvement of birth companions during child birth in St Paul’s Hospital Millennium Medical College (SPHMMC) and its selected catchment health centers. Methodology: The study used a cross-sectional study which was supplemented by qualitative study design which employed phenomenological design was conducted using in depth interview of health care providers who were on practice during the study period in SPHMMC. Result: The study included a total 58 health care providers. The finding from the study showed that great proportion of health care providers involved in the study (90 %) have positive attitude towards involvement of birth companions but majority 82.4 % didn’t allow birth companions. The commonest reasons mentioned for not involving companions include fear of breach of privacy, interference with routine medical care and risk of litigation/complaints.Conclusion and Recommendation: The findings from this study showed that majority of the health care providers are against the practice of involving birth companions. Since involvement of birth companions is one way to ensure the quality of care provided there should be an effort to increase the knowledge of health professionals on benefits of birth companions. There is also a need for improvement of the work setup. Simple measures like providing screens, providing separate rooms for laboring and post-partum women will have a significant impact on the quality of care provided.