Hand washing practices amongst mothers of under-fives in an urban slum

Abstract

Background: Hand washing with soap is a cost-effective tool of disease prevention, but most of the time it is overlooked. Use of contaminated hands enhances transmission of germs into body causing ill-health. Mothers clean, prepare, serve and feed the food. If this is coupled with poor knowledge and practice of hand washing it increases risk to spread of diseases to self, other family members especially to under-fives. Present study was conducted to address this issue being a critical factor in disease prevention. The objective of the present study was to determine the knowledge and practices of hand washing amongst mothers of under-fives.Methods: Present cross sectional study was conducted at UHTC, field practice area of Community Medicine, GMC, Latur amongst mothers of under-fives visiting UHTC to avail health services. The data was collected in a predesigned, pretested questionnaire by interviewing them.Results: Out of 204 mothers, 38.24% were from the age group of 24-26 and majority i.e., 69.61% were housewives. 99.02% mothers were aware that unwashed hands can transmit the diseases. Most of the mothers told that clean hands reduces food and water contamination. Maximum i.e., 97.57% mothers washed hands before eating and 71.57% washed before cooking. All the mothers washed hands after visiting toilet. Most mothers used soap and water (85.3%) for hand washing. Significant numbers of mothers, under-fives and other members suffered from diarrhea in last six months (p<0.05).Conclusions: Hand washing practices need to be followed at all critical moments for prevention of the faeco-oral infections.

Evaluation of WASH indicators associated with diarrhoeal disease among under-five children in an urban slum pocket, Mumbai city, India: a community-based repeated cross-sectional study

“…Similar observations were reported (89-100%) in an urban slum in Latur, Maharashtra (Quazi et al 2019), but the frequency was that the same practice was reported to be lower in Kolkata-based (66-70%) and in Ethiopia-based (62-78%)-based studies (Ali et al 2018;Melese et al 2019). In another post-defaecation handwashing study, Mohd & Malik (2017) reported frequencies to be 93.8% in Bangalore city, which is similar to our observations; however, washing hands after cleaning children post defaecation was reported to be considerably low (33%).…”

“…In another post-defaecation handwashing study, Mohd & Malik (2017) reported frequencies to be 93.8% in Bangalore city, which is similar to our observations; however, washing hands after cleaning children post defaecation was reported to be considerably low (33%). In this study, the rate of handwashing before cooking food and eating was found to be between 47.3 and 56.3%, respectively, which is slightly higher (40-43%) than that in a Kolkata-based study (Ali et al 2018), while the study based in Latur showed a higher frequency at 70-98% (Quazi et al 2019).…”

“…Several studies on different aspects of WASH have been conducted in urban and rural settings in India in the past few years by Kundu et al (2018) (Delhi), Quazi et al (2019) and Reddy et al (2017) (Andhra Pradesh, Uttarakhand and West Bengal), Bauza et al (2019) (rural Odisha), Mohd & Malik (2017) (Bangalore) and (Subbaraman et al 2013;Devansh Jalota 2014;Singh et al 2019) (Mumbai). Most of these studies either focused on the behavioural knowledge of mothers on WASH practices or only on microbial water quality assessment.…”

Postnatal newborn care practices and knowledge of newborn danger signs among mothers in rural area of Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh

“…These findings were also supported by some other studies. [ 30 31 ]…”