Impact of Health Talk on the Knowledge About Menstrual Hygiene Among School Going Early Adolescent Girls

Abstract

BACKGROUNDAdolescence is a period of transition from childhood to adulthood. It is the period of life between ages of 10-19 years. Lack of knowledge and poor personal hygienic practices can lead to various gynaecological problems including reproductive tract infections. Awareness regarding menstruation was about (63.38%) in urban and (47.57%). in rural area. METHODSThis is a cross sectional study, done in school going adolescent girls between 10-14 years of age, attending a private school. Data was collected by using predesigned questionnaire. Health talk was given and again the same questionnaire was administered after one week. Score was allotted to the questions related to the knowledge about menstrual hygiene. Data was entered in Microsoft excel sheet and analysed by using Epi-Info Version 7.2.2 and paired t-test was done. RESULTS184 adolescent girls participated in the study and the mean score before health talk was 3.64 and score was 5.18 after the talk. Paired t test was applied to the score obtained and difference in the mean score was found to be statistically significant. CONCLUSIONSHealth talk can increase the knowledge of adolescent girls about the menstrual hygiene.