Knowledge, attitude and practices of hand washing among mothers of children under-five years in Munarya Sub-county, Kapchorwa District

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: Hand washing among mothers of children under-five years at critical moments is still low and most Ugandans are still susceptible to diarrheal and acute respiratory diseases. This is mainly among mothers of children under-five years because they are the main caretakers. Poor hand washing also makes hands a major pathway through which fecal-oral diseases are transmitted. The Ugandan government recommends hand washing among mothers to control diarrheal diseases among children under-five years. However, only 37% and 58% in the rural and urban population practice hand washing in Uganda. OBJECTIVE: To assess the knowledge, attitude and practices of hand washing among mothers of children under-five years in Munarya Sub-County, Kapchorwa District. METHODOLOGY: A cross sectional study design was conducted with the use of quantitative methods of data collection. A semi structured questionnaire and a checklist were used to collect data among 146 mothers. Data was entered into Epidata 3.0 software and exported to STATA 13 for univariate and bivariate analysis. In the univariate and bivariate analysis, frequencies and percentages of knowledge, attitudes and practices were presented using tables and figures. RESULTS: A total of 146 mothers of children under-five years participated in the study. It was found out that 97.26% of the mothers were married. On average every household had five people with one child under-five years. From this study, all mothers knew that unclean hands transmit germs. Over 76.03% knew clean water and soap are the major requirement for hand washing. 95.21% agreed that washing hands before feeding and breastfeeding a child was important and 96.58% agreed that it was important for mothers of children under-five years to be taught hand washing. Only 26.03% had hand washing facilities at different positions like outside the latrine and kitchen and 39.04% of mothers reported to have washed hands on the day of the interview. CONCLUSION: From this study, mothers of children under-five years in the study area have sufficient knowledge and attitudes but the hand washing practice among mothers of children under- five years is still low. Mothers of children under-five years in Munarya sub-County need to improve on hand washing practices.