Mothers knowledge about neonatal danger signs and associated factors in Gelalo woreda, Afar region, Ethiopia

Abstract

Background: Neonatal danger signs are clinical signs that indicate high risk of neonatal morbidity and mortality and the need for early therapeutic intervention. Early detection of neonatal illness is an important step towards improving neonatal health. Knowledge of mothers in recognition of this neonatal danger signs early is very crucial in decreasing neonatal mortality but most studies show that mother’s knowledge in recognition of these danger signs are very low. Objective: To assess mothers knowledge about neonatal danger signs and associated factors in Gelalo woreda, Afar region, Ethiopia from March 01 to March 20, 2018. Methods and materials: Community based cross-sectional study was conducted and data was collected from the sampled 860 mothers. The survey participants were selected by simple random sampling technique. Collected data was entered and analyzed using SPSS version 20. Bivariate logistic regression was performed to assess association between independent and dependent variable. All variables with p value of less than 0.25 were entered into multivariate logistic regression to control for all possible confounders and to identify factors associated with mothers knowledge. Odds Ratios along with 95% CI were estimated to measure the strength of the association. Level of statistical significance was declared at p-value less than or equal to 0.05 Result: A total of 860 mothers were included in this study. Mothers who had good knowledge about neonatal danger signs were 103 (12.0%). Husband with tertiary education (AOR=2.02, 95% CI: 1.39, 9.31), ANC follow up (AOR=1.22, 95% CI: 0.32, 4.61), receive counseling during ANC (AOR=3.73, 95% CI: (1.58, 8.78), delivered by health professional (AOR=2.73, 95% CI: 1.39, 5.38), and receive PNC (AOR=5.05, 95% CI: 2.67, 9.54) were found to be significantly associated with mothers knowledge about neonatal danger signs. Conclusion and Recommendation: Mothers knowledge about neonatal danger signs was low in this study area. This indicates that majority of mothers delay in deciding to seek care and this could intern leads to death of neonates. Husband educational status, antenatal care visit, receives counseling during ANC, who assist during delivery, and postnatal care visit were significantly associated with mothers knowledge about neonatal danger signs. Neonatal health should be made an integral part of maternal and child health services with great emphasis should given to empower parents with education and to mothers who did not get ANC, PNC, delivery and counseling services is recommended.