"Impact of a Health Education–Based Interventional Plan on Knowledge About Exclusive Breastfeeding Among Mothers of Rural Area in Udaipur District"

Abstract

Background:-Every year, two million Indian children died before their fifth birthday, most of them from preventable causes. Globally it is recommend that infants be fed only breast milk for the first six months of life with no other foods or fluids not even water, referred as exclusive breastfeeding. However, in India, only 46 percent of infants were exclusively breastfed and rates have shown little improvement in the last decade.

Aim: - The present study aimed to improve the knowledge on exclusive Breastfeeding among Mothers of rural area in Udaipur District".

Methods: Evaluative research approach and pre- experimental, one-group pre-test - post-test research designs were adopted for this study. Using a non-probability, purposive sampling technique, 40 mothers were recruited from two villages from Gram Panchayat, Pratappura, Bhillo ka Bedla, Badgaon, Udaipur (Raj.). Tools include demographic data and a self-structured knowledge questionnaire. Data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential values by IBM statistical package for social sciences (SPSS; version 23) software.

Results: Data revealed that there is a lack of knowledge regarding exclusive Breastfeeding among Mothers and this knowledge can be increased by administering Health Education–Based Interventional Plan on knowledge of Breastfeeding. The mean and standard deviation of the post-test knowledge score of 12.21±3.12 was higher than the mean and standard deviation of the pre-test knowledge score 19.89±2.13. The calculated‘t’ value of 9.39 (p≤0.05) showed that there is a significant difference between the pre and post-test knowledge scores.There is no association between knowledge and selected demographic variables like age, religion, type of family, education, occupation and source of knowledge.

Conclusions: It is required to focus on Health Education–Based Interventional Plan to improve the knowledge regarding exclusive Breastfeeding among mothers.