An epidemiological study to assess the utilization of maternal and child health care services at sub-center level by the target population in Northern India, Kashmir valley

Abstract

Background: In any community mothers and children constitute an important and priority group especially in developing countries like India where, their numbers (constituting up to 2/3 rd of total population), vulnerability to morbidity and mortality (constituting as special risk group) and amenability to prevention of ill health and mortality, to a large extent, makes them candidate for special attention. By improving health of mothers and children in any society we contribute to a large segment of general population and it is because of this special and usually combined health services for mother and child, the Maternal and Child Health (MCH) Services are considered globally more so in developing countries. The main aim of MCH Services remains to ensure that, throughout pregnancy and puerperium, every mother maintains optimal health and at the end of pregnancy we have a healthy mother and a healthy baby and promote the child health throughout the infancy and childhood. Delivery of MCH services to the vast majority of rural communities has been through Sub-centers that are manned by two Multipurpose Health Workers (one male and one female [ANM]) and cover a population of 5000 in plain areas and 3000 in hilly or difficult terrain areas. The functions of female worker are mainly confined to Maternal and Child health (essential obstetric care, new born care, child health promotion, family planning, health education. Aims & Objective: To assess the Utilisation of maternal and child health services at Sub-center level by target population in a sub-center area. Material and Methods: A sample of 40 sub centres was obtained by multistage sampling procedure. The sample size was obtained by calculating number of mother child pair beneficiaries to be interviewed for assessing the utilization of maternal and child health services. Results: Out of the total 671 mothers studied 640 (95.4%) beneficiaries had received any antenatal checkup while 4.6% had not received any antenatal checkup. Only 10.3% of the women had greater than 3 antenatal checkups at the sub centre while 5.46 % had received 3 antenatal checks up and 1.4 % had less than 3 antenatal checkups at sub centre. MPHW (Female) was the service provider for antenatal care in only 3.1% of cases while 86.4% of the women preferred a doctor for antenatal checkups. Conclusion: Utilization of antenatal services is very low, intranatal is almost non-existent, post natal maternal services are decimal but child health services and some components of family planning services are being utilized from sub centers.

Assessment of knowledge of ASHA workers regarding MCH services and practices followed by mothers – A field study

“…As per the study conducted by Baba et al . [ 30 ] in Kashmir, only 5% of the deliveries were conducted at the subcenter, 30.8% at CHC, 17.28% at primary health centre (PHC), and about 3% at home, while 34.7% of the deliveries were conducted at a tertiary care hospital and 8.49% in other places (private nursing homes). This trend may be due to the cultural beliefs prevalent in the area which affect the utilization of maternal services available in the area.…”