A survey to assess the knowledge, practice, and attitude on acute respiratory infection among mothers of under five children at MCH clinic, Ramghat, Pokhara, Nepal

Acute respiratory infection is the most common and frequent illnesses experienced globally. It is found that about two million deaths cases are recorded each year. Number of death cases by this disease is highest in the developing countries. Various environmental and host factors are associated with the morbidity and mortality rate due to ARI. The environmental factors are overcrowding, large family, high population density, poor housing condition, poor socio-economic status, parental smoking and environmental pollution etc. The host factors are avoidance of exclusive breast feeding, poor nutrition and absence of immunization against specific respiratory illness such as measles, whooping cough, and diphtheria.

To assess the knowledge, practice and attitude of mothers about acute respiratory tract infection (ARI), to find the association between the knowledge and selected variables, to find the correlation between knowledge score and attitude, to find the correlation between knowledge score and practice and to ascertain the relationship between the practice and attitude.

A survey conducted among 100 mothers attending the MCH clinic, Ramghat, Pokhara, Kaski District, Nepal.

Out of 100 mothers, 45% of mothers were between the ages of 20–25 years, 66% of the mothers belonged to nuclear family and majority 66% of the mothers had five family members. About 47% of the mothers were literate up to secondary level, 71% of the mothers were housewife. About 41% of mothers were having one child, 93% mothers had completed immunization for their children and 98% with monthly income of > 1$. About 92% of the mothers were non-vegetarian, 71% of them had pakka house, 85% had cross ventilation, 95% with adequate lighting, and 99% had neat and clean surrounding. About 87% of the mothers had organized disposal of waste material and 33% of them gets health related information from newspaper/TV/other media. Regarding knowledge on ARI, 73% of the mothers had fair knowledge and 5% had poor knowledge. About 97% of the mothers had good practice and none were with poor practice on ARI. Regarding attitude on ARI, 91% of the mothers had good attitude and no mothers with poor attitude. There was no significant association between the knowledge score and selected variables like age, type of family, education, immunization, family income, food habit, cross ventilation and disposal of waste material. There was no significant correlation between the knowledge and attitude, knowledge and practice but there was significant correlation between the practice and attitude.

The study was conducted aiming to find out the levels of knowledge, practice and attitude of the mothers about ARI. The study findings revealed that 73% of the mothers had fair knowledge on ARI, 97% of them had good practice, and 91% of them had good attitude towards ARI. There was no significant association between the knowledge score and selected variables like age, type of family, education, immunization, family income, food habit, cross ventilation and disposal of waste material. There was no significant correlation between the knowledge and attitude (p>0.05). There was no significant correlation between the knowledge and practice (p>0.05). There was significant correlation between the practice and attitude (p<0.05).