DOES HEALTH EDUCATION INCREASE THE COMPLIANCE TO ORAL IRON THERAPY AMONG PREGNANT WOMEN?

Introduction: Anaemia is a global health problem primarily affecting pregnant women and children .It is found that though there are various programs organized to prevent anaemia the prevalence of anaemia has still not reduced. There are various factors which contribute to anaemia in pregnancy. The role of health education in compliance to oral iron therapy has still not been thoroughly studied. Therefore this study was undertaken Objectives: 1). To study socio demographic factors contributing to compliance oral iron therapy. 2) To study the reasons for noncompliance among the pregnant women. Methods: It is an epidemiological interventional study which was conducted at Cheetah Camp Maternity Hospital .A total of 386 pregnant women, divided in two groups of 193 each (interventional and control) in the second trimester were included in the study. Two health education sessions were conducted. Compliance to oral iron therapy was recorded twice, once before initiation and second at the end of health education session. Results: In this study it was found that age of the pregnant women, occupation, age of first pregnancy and per capita income did not have any significant role to play in compliance to oral iron therapy for both the follow up visits. It is found that education plays an important role in compliance to oral iron therapy during the first follow up visit. The most common reason for noncompliance during both the visits was non availability of the drugs and the patients forgetting to take the iron tablets Conclusion: Health education is an effective tool to improve compliance to oral iron therapy.