A study to determine the knowledge attitude and experiences of pregnant women towards prevention of mother to child transmission of HIV/AIDS at UTH and Chikankata mission hospital.

Abstract

Mother to Child Transmission is by far the largest source of HIV infection in children below the age of 15 and has become a critical child health problem in Africa. The aim of the study was to determine the Knowledge, Attitude and Experiences of pregnant women towards the Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission of HIV at University Teaching Hospital (UTH) and Chikankata Mission Hospital. The literature for the study looked at Mother to Child Transmission (MTCT) of HIV as a worldwide problem. Reference was made to global, regional and national studies on MTCT obtained from local and international publications. A comparative, cross-sectional, descriptive and non-interventional study design was used. The study units were drawn from an urban and rural site between August and September, 2002. A sample comprising 60 respondents, i.e. 30 from the urban (UTH) and 30 from the rural (Chikankata) were selected by simple random sampling with replacement. A structured interview schedule was used to collect data for pregnant women. The Data collected was analysed manually. The results of the study revealed that 30% of the respondents with low level of knowledge were from Chikankata while only 7% were from UTH. Majority of the respondents from both Chikankata and UTH that is 77% had medium level of knowledge. It also revealed that all respondents from UTH had a positive attitude while 33% of Chikankata respondents had a negative attitude. Majority of the respondents from both Chikankata and UTH had good experiences. It is evident from the study that the level of knowledge greatly influences attitude, while attitude also influences the experiences. An individual who is knowledgeable about a certain topic is inclined to have a positive attitude as observed in the research subjects. On the other hand, the level of knowledge does not necessarily determine the level of experience, hence there was no relationship between knowledge and experience. It was concluded from the study that knowledge on PMTCT of HIV, enabled the pregnant women develop positive attitude which in turn resulted to good experiences.