Knowledge and practices regarding menstrual hygiene- an observational analysis among adolescent girlsvisiting medical college different outpatient departments at Jhansi (U.P.)

Background: Menstruation in women is a normal physiological process and key sign of reproductive health. Poor menstrual hygiene is a problem in many developing countries. Proper menstrual hygiene is essential for one’s own wellbeing and development. Objectives-to evaluate the knowledge and practice regarding menstrualhygiene among adolescent girls and to determine the co-relation of knowledge and practice levels among the adolescent girls. Methods: It was an observational analytical study conducted at different OPD of medical college, Jhansi from July 2017 to June 2018 among adolescent girls aged (10-19 years). Information on demographic variables which include age, class, type of family, education of mother, family income, age of menarche was collected from the participants. Validity of questionnaire was checked by pilot testing. Knowledge and Practices level were categorized into good, fair and poor. Epi-info software was used for data analysis and chi-square test was used. Results: 66% of girls belonged to late adolescent stage. 72% of participants had prior knowledge about menstruation, while the most common source of information was mother (62%), only 8.5% girls had good knowledge and 20 % girls had good practices. Education of mother had statistical significant effect on knowledge scores of the participants. Conclusion: It was found that the awareness about menstrual hygiene was still poor, less than 10 percent have good knowledge. The girls should be educated about significance of menstruation and development of secondary sexual characteristics, selection of sanitary menstrual absorbent, and its proper sanitary disposal.