A Preface Noesis Regarding General Health Awareness among the Rural
Mass
Srivastava, Kishu Tripathi
Shom Prakash Kushwaha, Pavan Kumar, Sunil
Kumar Rawat, Abhishek, Poonam Parashar, Altaf Hussain, Priyanka Singh, Shikha *
Sagar Institute of Technology and
Management, Department of Pharmacy, 6th Km. Stone, Faizabad
Road, Barabanki, Uttar Pradesh, 225001.
ABSTRACT:
Health promotion is knacks of assisting people to
enhance their motivation to strive for optimal health and supporting them in
altering their lifestyle to move toward a state of finest health. Lifestyle
transformation can be assisted through an amalgamation of experiences that
enhance awareness. In India health alertness among the mass is been propagated
from side to side through several media such as television, radio, newspaper,
health camp, holdings. Often a question arises: Are people aware about general
health issues such as family planning, vaccination? The general opinion was
assembled from people and signaled that a large section of people was aware
about family planning, vaccination, care for pediatric patient, care for women
during pregnancy and safe delivery, balanced diet (for lactating mothers,
infant and children) and various health programs organized by
government/non-government organization to the people. On the other hand, people
were not sure about their awareness regarding disease in the locality and care
of old age patients and thus these restraining features need consideration and
reflection in deeds.
KEYWORDS: family planning,
vaccination, care for geriatric patient, health awareness
INTRODUCTION:
India is perched to witness supplementary growth in its
economy as a result of positive trends within healthcare sector1.
Healthcare in India features raising levels of nutrition and living standard of people. Diseases ground premature death as well as
structural/functional limitations, thus seriously affect the quality of life.
Assessment of quality of life provides a measurement of well being and focuses
on aspects of a patient's life beyond symptoms and
signs2. Intensive efforts have been made to improve family planning, vaccination and health services. Health promotion assists people to enhance their motivation to strive
for optimal health and supporting them in altering their lifestyle to move
toward a state of optimal health (balance of material, emotional, communal,
spiritual and intellectual health). Lifestyle transformations are usually
through an amalgamation of experiences that enhance awareness, increase
motivation3. In India health alertness among the mass is been
propagated from side to side through several media such as television, radio,
newspaper, health camp, holdings.
GOALS
AND OBJECTIVES:
Often
a question arises: Are people aware about general health issues such as family
planning, vaccination? Information regarding general health awareness among the
mass in a village of Uttar Pradesh, India province was gathered during
Community Visit 2011. The specific objectives were to estimate attentiveness of
the mass regarding:
·
Family planning
·
Vaccination
·
Care for pediatric
patient
·
Care for women
during pregnancy and safe delivery
·
Balanced diet for
lactating mothers, infant and children
·
Care for geriatric
patient
·
Knowledge
about various health programs organized by government/non-government organization
·
Commonly occurring
disease in locality
METHOD:
Sample size:
Information
was collected from 234 persons comprising of 114 men (21-80 years of age) and
120 women (21-80 years of age).
Information collection:
Facts
were collected by 5 teams each consisting of 3 persons. Each team included a supervisor and two
interviewers (one female and one male). Interviewers asked questions regarding
awareness related to family planning, vaccination, care for pediatric patient,
care for women during pregnancy and safe delivery, balanced diet (for lactating
mothers, infant and children), care for geriatric patient, knowledge about various
health programs organized by government/non-government organization, commonly
occurring disease in locality. The
responses of people were recorded as positive (Yes) or negative (No).
RESULTS:
The assembled data presented interesting features.
(Table 1)
Table 1: Responses of mass
regarding health awareness.
|
S. No. |
Query: Are you aware about: |
Yes (%) |
No (%) |
|
1. |
Family planning |
88 |
12 |
|
2. |
Vaccination |
85 |
15 |
|
3. |
Care for pediatric patient |
82 |
18 |
|
4. |
Care for women during pregnancy and safe delivery |
86 |
14 |
|
5. |
Balanced diet for lactating mothers, infant and
children |
85 |
15 |
|
6. |
Care for geriatric patient |
53 |
47 |
|
7. |
Commonly occurring disease in locality |
63 |
37 |
|
8. |
Knowledge about various health programs organized by
government/non-government organization |
87 |
13 |
DISCUSSION:
Inspirational facts:
Efforts
to perk up family planning accompanied by systematic and stepwise effort to
upgrade maternal health services over several years is as cost effective as
childhood immunization or treatment of malaria, tuberculosis4. In many countries, uptake
of modern contraception is constrained by limited access and weak service
delivery and burden of unintended pregnancy is still large5. Vaccination for diseases such as
measles, poliomyelitis and neonatal tetanus significantly reduces mortality and
morbidity attributable to these diseases6. Intensive care of
neonatal especially babies having low birth weight is very important7.
Care for pediatric patient is especially
important with respect to dose of medicine, as dose calculation is individually
based on the patient’s weight, age, body surface area and condition of patient.
This is more likely in case of over the counter medicine as patient guardian
often select the dose themselves.
Undernutrition continues to be a primary cause of ill health and premature mortality
among children in developing countries8 and childhood underweight is
one of the leading causes of global burden of disease9. The magnitude of malnutrition is generally
assessed by comparing the food energy intake of persons as compared to proposed
norms10. To prevent or minimize this problem, nutrition programme have embraced the provision of supplements such
as iron, folic acid, vitamin A and iodinated salt to the people11.
Figure 1: General health awareness among the mass
Figure 2: General health awareness regarding care for
geriatric patient and commonly occurring disease in locality
The
congregated information gestured (figure 1) that a bulky section of people are
sentient about family planning (Yes = 88%), vaccination (Yes = 85%), care for
pediatric patient (Yes = 82%), care for women during pregnancy and safe
delivery (Yes = 86%) and balanced diet for lactating mothers, infant and
children (Yes = 85%). This may be the result of the reach of the various health
awareness programs organized by government/non-government organization to the people (Yes
= 87%). It can not be overruled that due to limited
sample study, an elaborated study is required as to have findings in a more
elaborated way.
Factual
requiring contemplation:
Geriatric patients are at elevated risks several
factors such as postural hypotension, polypharmacy
(more than three prescription medications). Interventional areas that have
unique implications for older patients include immunizations, diet, exercise
etc12. There is no set age at which patients may be under the
care of a geriatrician and thus people
should have a glimpse of this issue.
Health trends in the next 25 years will be
determined mainly by factors such as mortality rates from communicable,
maternal, perinatal and nutritional disorders13.
A communicable disease
is transmitted through people, animals, surfaces, foods or air and fall back on
fluid exchange, contaminated substances or close contact between infected and
healthy individual. Thus the best possible way to be away from a communicable disease is to prevent its infection.
A non communicable disease is a medical condition
which is non-infectious and more prevalent in developing countries where they
double the burden of infective diseases14. They are of long duration, slow
progression and include diseases such as cancer, asthma, diabetes. We need to know the incidence and prevalence rates as
knowing the incidence and prevalence rates enables us to interpret disease
epidemiologic patterns and hence plan for interventions can be executed. The disease progression
can also be delayed by following a healthy life style. It was observed that
people were not sure about the disease
prevalent in locality (communicable/non communicable, Yes = 63%) and special care
required by old age patients (Yes = 53%). Consequently awareness related to
possible disease in the locality (communicable/non communicable) and more
effective care of old age patients should be stressed as to benefit every
person of society in more elaborated manner.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS:
The
authors acknowledge the full cooperation and guidance of Ms Madhu
Agarwal, Executive Director, Sagar
Institute of Technology and Management, Barabanki.
The authors offer special thanks to the survey students whose dedication and
overall competence made this survey possible.
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Received on 26.12.2011 Accepted on 07.02.2012
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