A Study to Assess the Knowledge and Attitude of Postnatal Mother’s regarding Breast feeding at selected Hospital, Mangalagiri, Guntur District A.P.

 

Prathipati Manasa, Pedapalli Latha Theresa

 

ABSTRACT:

 

 

INTRODUCTION:

“Breast feeding is an unequalled way of providing ideal food for the healthy growth and development of infants, it is also an integral part of the reproductive process with important implications for the health of mother”¹. Breast feeding is a basic human activity, WHO recommends that, babies should be initially breast feed within the first hour of their life and should continue breast feed at least six months of the life. Mother should provide breast feed until two years of the life. Breast feeding is the most natural way to feed the baby. Colostrum is the first milk produced in first 3 to 4 days of post partum period. It is regarded as the first vaccine for the newborn².

The amount of breast milk prodution depends on initiation and duration of feeding, Consuming the foods that are rich in proteins and calcium and free from stress can increase breast milk production³.

 

The benefits of Breast feeding are they act as a ideal nutrition for babies, it is easily digestable, lowers the risk of allergies and asthma, obesity and increase IQ score in later childhood, physical closeness helps the baby to develop bond with the mother, gains the right amount of weight, babies who are exclusively Breast feed for the first six months of life without any formula feed have fewer ear infections, respiratory illnesses, diarrhoea. Some of the benefits of breast feeding for the mother are includes it burns extra calories, it helps in reducing pregnancy weight faster, lowers the risk of ovarian cancer and breast cancer, breast feeding saves time and money, it also gives you regular time to relax quietly with your new born which improves bonding⁴.

 

Lack of breast stimulation and other factors that reduces Breast milk production are stress, anxiety, separation of the mother and the child(return to work), hormonal imbalance (thyroid gland, polycystic ovarian syndrome, diabetis type 1 or 2), insufficient breast tissue, surgery to the breast or nipple, mothers who consume drugs, alcohol, medications, breast injury/ bad breast feeding position, poor nutrition to the mother (less than 1500 calories per day).

 

OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY:

1.     To assess the level of knowledge of postnatal mothers regarding Breast feeding.

2.     To assess the level of attitude of postnatal mothers regarding Breast feeding.

3.     To correlate the knowledge and attitude regarding Breast feeding among postnatal mothers.

4.     To find the association between knowledge of post natal mothers with their selected demographic variables.

 

HYPOTHESIS:

H₁: There will be significant difference between the knowledge levels of postnatal mothers with regard to Breast feeding.

H₂: There will be significant difference between the level of attitude postnatal mothers regarding Breast feeding.

H₃: There will be significant relationship between the knowledge and attitude of postnatal mothers with regard to Breast feeding.

H₄:   Significant association will be there between knowledge and attitude of postnatal mother with regard to Breast feeding with their selected demographic variables.

 

MATERIALS AND METHODS:

Research Approach and Design:

Quantitative research approach and a descriptive survey design was used to conduct the study.

 

Setting of the study:

The study was conducted at Postnatal ward, NRI General Hospital, chinakakani, Guntur (DT).

 

Sample and sampling technique:

A total of 100 postnatal mothers were selected by convenient sampling technique.

 

Criteria for sampling selection:

INCLUSION CRITERIA:

The present study includes the women who are:

·       Willing to participate in the study.

·       In the age group of below 20 years to 36 years and above.

·       admitted at postnatal ward, NRI General Hospital.

·       available at the time of Data collection.

·       able to read, write and understand Telugu only.

 

DESCRIPTION OF THE TOOL:

A structured knowledge questionnaire and rating scale was developed in English and the same was translated to telugu which is used to collect the data. The questionnaire consist of 3 sections.

 

Section A: Baseline Data:

It consist of 9 base line characters like age, religion, education, occupation, family income, type of family, dietary pattern, place of residence and parity.

 

Section B: Knowledge questionnaire:

It consist of 26 multiple choice questions on knowledge regarding breast feeding. Each item consists of 4 options, among them one is correct option and remaining 3 are distracters. The subjects who get the score 75% and above are considered as adequate knowledge and 50-75% are considered as having moderately favourable knowledge and below 50% are considered as having inadequate knowledge.

 

Section C: Attitude scale:

It consist of 5 point Likert scale with 13 statements of attitude scale regarding Breast feeding. Each statement has 5 point scale ranging from Strongly agree, Agree, Not sure, Disagree, Strongly agree. Each point of scale carries a score ‘1’. For the positive statements the score is been allotted as 5, 4, 3, 2 and 1 and for negative statements score has been distributed as 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. The maximum score is 65. The subjects who get the score above 75% and above are considered as highly favourable attitude and 50-75% are considered as having moderately favourable attitude and below 50% are having unfavourable attitude towards Breast feeding.

 

RELIABILITY OF THE TOOL:

Reliability of the tool was tested by split half method. The ‘r’ value was 0.85 for knowledge questionnaire and attitude scale. Which shows that the tool is highly reliable.

 

PILOT STUDY:

Pilot study was conducted on ten post natal mothers from the Samvidha Mother and Child Hospital, Mangalagiri, Guntur (DT). written consent was taken to conduct the study. The samples were given knowledge questionnaire and collected the data. It took an average time of 45- to 50 minutes to complete the questionnaire. These subjects are not included in the main study.

 

Ethical considerations:

Ethical clearance is taken from the institutional ethical committee.

 

Collection of the data:

After obtaining prior permission from the Hospital authority, the investigator informed the purpose of the study and requested sample to cooperate during the study. The written consent were taken from the participants, instructions were given to the mother with the help of staff nurse. The structured questionnaire was distributed to 100 postnatal mothers. The investigator had collected back the tool after 40 minutes. It took a period of one week to complete the sample size.

 

Plan of analysis:

The data are analysed based on objectives and hypothesis of the study by using descriptive and inferential statistics. Frequencies, percentage, mean, standard deviation, chi-square test and correlation coefficient are used to analyse the data.

 

RESULTS:

SECTION-I:

Characteristics of the study sample.

Age:

It shows that out of 100 postnatal mothers, 69 (69%) of postnatal mothers are in the age group of below 20 to 25years.

 

Education:

The above data explains that out of 100 postnatal mothers, 33% postnatal mothers are with primary education.

 

Religion:

It reveals that out of 100 postnatal mothers 48% of the postnatal mothers are Hindus.

 

Monthly family Income:

It shows that out of 100 postnatal mothers that 44% postnatal mothers are with income RS. 10,001 to RS.15,000.

 

Type of family:

It reveals that out of 100 postnatal mothers that 58% are with joint famil.

 

Dietary patter:

It identifies that out of 100 postnatal mothers 69% of the postnatal mothers are having mixed diet i.e vegetarian food and non-vegetarian food.

 

Occupation:

It analyses that out of 100 postnatal mothers 75% of the postnatal mothers are Housewife.

 

Place of Residence:

The above data explains that out of 100 postnatal mothers 58% of the postnatal mothers are residing at Rural area.

 

Parity:

It identifies that out of 100 postnatal mothers 50% of the postnatal mothers are having two children

 

Table.1 shows Findings showing the Relationship between Knowledge and Attitude of Postnatal mothers regarding Breast feeding.

Reference Group	Variable	Mean	Pearson’s correlation value (r)	Table value	level of significance
Post natal mothers	Knowledge	13.59	r= 0.85  df =18.2	0.707	P<0.05
	Attitude	44.95

The mean knowledge score of the respondents is 13.59 and the mean attitude score of respondents was 44.95. Hence the null hypothesis H₀₂ is rejected and the research hypothesis H₃ is accepted.

 

SECTION-II

Table 2 shows that Frequency and Percentage Distribution Based on theKnowledge Level of Postnatal mothers with Regard to Breast feeding.                                                                                                                                                                                                               N=100

Level of Knowledge	Reference Group	Range of Scores	Frequency	Percentage
Adequate knowledge (>75%)	Postnatal mothers	19-26	10	10
Moderately adequate Knowledge (50-75%)	Postnatal mothers	10-18	73	73
Inadequate knowledge (<50%)	Postnatal mothers	0-9	17	17

 

Fig.1 Distribution of the samples by their level of knowledge with regard to Breast Feeding.

 

SECTION-III:

Table-3 Frequency and Percentage Distribution Based on the Attitude Level of Postnatal mother with Regard to Breast feeding.

Attitude level	Reference group	Range of     scores	Percentage
Favourable attitude (>75%)	Postnatal mothers	45-65	53%
Moderately favourable attitude (50-75%)	Postnatal mothers	23-44	47%
Unfavourable attitude (<50%)	Postnatal mothers	1-22	0%

 

Fig. 2 Distribution of the samples by their attitude level with regard to Breast Feeding.

 

DISCUSSION:

The findings of the present study revealed that nearly 73% of the postnatal mothers are having moderately adequate knowledge and 53% moderately favourable attitude. The Sharmin Majumder, 2018 conducted a study on Knowledge and attitude of essentials of new born care among postnatal mothers in the Dhaka Medical College Hospital, Bangladesh, the findings of the study revealed that out of 211 postnatal mothers, 37% of the postnatal mothers are having moderately adequate knowledge and 47.4% are having favourable attitude and none of the postnatal mothers are having unfavourable attitude towards Breast feeding.

 

CONCLUSION:

The following conclusions were drawn on the basis of study results.

1.     The findings of the study revealed that the postnatal mothers had adequate knowledge and favourable attitude regarding Breast feeding.

2.     There was significant difference between knowledge and attitude scores of postnatal mothers.

3.     There was significant relationship between knowledge and attitude scores of postnatal mothers.

 

REFERENCES:

1.      Seena Girish and M. Gandhimathi Primipara Mother’s Knowledge, Attitude and Practice of Breast feeding 2015, seena. girish@gmail .com

2.      Poreddi Vijayalakshmi P, Susheela T, Mythili D. Knowledge, attitudes, and breast feeding practices of postnatal mothers: a crosssectional survey. 2015;9(4):364-74. www.saspublisher.com

3.      Noora Farhan Abedi, Dr. Kafi Mohammed Nasir Al-Asadi Assessment of Mother’s Knowledge towards Breastfeeding at AL-Najaf City.

4.      Deeapali Ambike, Abhijit Ambike, Swati Raje, Sanjana Chincholikar Knowledge, awareness and breast-feeding practices of postnatal mothers in a rural teaching hospital a cross sectional survey 2017; aambike@gmail.com.

5.      Sindu Thomas, Poornima S, Vinay M Knowledge, Attitude and Practice of Mothers regarding Breast feeding: A Cross Sectional study in selected Rural Area of Mandya district, Karnataka.

6.      Sharmin Majumder, A Study on Knowledge and Attitude of essentials of New Born care among Postnatal Mothers in the Dhaka Medical College Hospital, Bangladesh2018.

 

 

 

Received on 29.12.2019          Modified on 13.01.2020

Accepted on 31.01.2020   © A&V Publications all right reserved