Practice of personal hygiene among rural women of a selected community in Bangladesh

Abstract

Background : Good health is a marker of good economic status of a nation. Personal hygiene should be maintained first for obtaining great accuracy in work, low suffering from diseases and to reduce possibility of diseases. Objective : This study was undertaken to assess practice of personal hygiene among rural women of a selected community in Bangladesh. Materials & Methods : A descriptive type of cross sectional study was conducted during March-June 2012. 150 women of various ages selected from Garibpur and Tangurpur villages of Jessore District to assess two basic components of personal hygiene, hand washing and safe drinking water. Non probability convenient sampling technique was followed and data were collected by face to face interview using pre tested, self administered, semi structured questionnaire. Results : The mean age of the respondents was 33 years. Regarding educational qualification, 87.33% were educated in different levels and 12.67% were illiterate. Occupational status revealed majority (74.67%) of them were housewives. Regarding economic condition, most (60%) of the respondents had family income <10,000 Taka. In this study, majority (87.34%) had practiced hand washing before eating. Among them on taking different types of food (86.26%) practiced hand washing before taking meals only 13.74% before taking breakfast and none of the respondents washed hands before taking any dry food. Majority (95.34%) practiced hand washing after defecation, among them (82%) used soap, 16% used ash and 2% used soil after defecation. In this study, majority (90.67%) used tube well which was not marked red, 6% used pond and 3.33% used river as their source of drinking water. Conclusion : Good practice of personal hygiene and use of safe drinking water has significant importance to lead a healthy life, the villagers of Bangladesh should be well motivated regarding this aspect by regular health education programmes.

Knowledge and Practice of Personal Hygiene among Rural Women in Northern Bangladesh

“…Most of the women of Northern Bangladesh know that they need to wash hand before eating food. Similar result was also found in a study conducted at Jessore district of Bangladesh [24]. A significant difference (χ 2 = 10.86, P˂0.01) was found among the mother of three district of Northern Bangladesh in the habit of washing hand before feeding child.…”

“…But it is sorry to share that 80% of the fisherman used water only for washing hand. Sometimes it is found that people are over concern on washing hand before eating regular meals but remain halfhearted to wash hand before eating any dry foods [24]. Similarly Sinha et al [25] found that 95% of the women washed their hands after using toilet but only 35% of them washed their hand before and after their meal.…”

“…The positive response (%) of the pregnant/lactating women or caregivers of U5 children from study HHs about the practice of washing hands for many daily hygienic activities such as before food preparation, after cleaning animal/bird's feces and other activities is deficient and needs further attention to improve the practice of washing hands as a good hygienic practice by the pregnant/lactating women or caregiver of U5 children for the study HHs fort their healthy life. Also, practices of washing hands for some of the daily activities such as washing hands before feeding the children, washing hands after baby's defecation by the pregnant/lactating women or caregivers of U5 children appear to be moderate, and practice levels for those aspects should also be improved [24].…”

Hygienic Practice during Complementary Feeding and Associated Factors among Mothers of Children Aged 6–24 Months in Bahir Dar Zuria District, Northwest Ethiopia, 2019

“…Each year, over 5 million children in developing countries die from either diarrhea or acute respiratory infections [11].Globally handwashing with soap at key times is as low as 2 to 35% [12]. An average of 65% of death caused by diarrheal diseases could be reduced if good hygiene practice accompanies with the provision of water and sanitation [13].…”

Гигиенические Аспекты Формирования Устойчивой Социальной Среды В Семье

“…Учеными и международными организациями, включая ВОЗ, ЮНИСЕФ и др., отмечается взаимосвязь состояния здоровья с обеспечением санитарии и гигиены; предложены руководящие принципы в области обеспечения безопасного сбора, хранения и удаления нечистот с акцентом на принятие мер, направленных на противодействие распространению короновирусной инфекции и учетом экономических факторов домохозяйств [16,20,22,63,105,120,128,143,146,147]. Доказано, что распространенность инфекционных заболеваний зависит от уровня соблюдения гигиены рук, личной гигиены, соблюдения правил обращения с пищевыми продуктами [2,10,17,22,31,42,70,75,98,105,114,124,133,142,146].…”