Knowledge, attitude and practice on prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV among pregnant women attending antenatal care at Juba teaching hospital, South Sudan

Abstract

Mother-to-child transmission (MTCT) of HIV remains the main and leading source of HIV infection among infants and children. It accounts for 90% of infancy and childhood HIV infection; hence prevention in this context has a big impact in controlling the spread of the HIV within this group. MTCT of HIV can happen during pregnancy, labour, delivery and breastfeeding period. Women’s knowledge on HIV/AIDS is an important component in PMTCT services coverage. Therefore knowledge and awareness on PMTCT of HIV has an impact on services uptake. Objectives: To assess level of knowledge, attitude and practice of prevention on mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT) of HIV among pregnant women attending antenatal care at Juba Teaching Hospital. Methodology: A hospital based cross sectional study was conducted at Juba Teaching Hospital, Maternal and Child Health Clinic within the period of November to December, 2015. Data were collected using a structured questionnaire given to pregnant mothers who were eligible and consented for the study participation. The information was then summarized into SPSS version 20, for windows and analyzed. Frequency distribution and two way tables were used to present and summarize the data. A p value of <0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results A total of two hundred and fifty one (251) pregnant women consented to participate in the study and were enrolled and interviewed at the MCHC in Juba Teaching Hospital. The mean age of the mothers was 25.67, with the standard deviation of ±5.52 years, with the youngest being 15 years and the oldest 41 years. Majority of them were married (88%), participants with no formal education were more than one-third (39.1%). More than a half (53.4%) of the participants were unemployed. One-third (30.7%) of the participants had sufficient knowledge on when to start PMTCT prophylaxis. Half of the pregnant women (51%) showed positive attitude toward PMTCT on HIV preventive measures. Two hundred and thirty one participants (92%) had received counseling for HIV, with (78.4%) of them reported being tested for HIV. Conclusion The study identified that, participants ‘knowledge on HIV/AIDS was moderate, specific knowledge on MTCT, MTCT risk factors during breastfeeding, and PMTCT prophylaxis was also found to be moderate. Half of the participants showed positive attitude towards PMTCT services utilization. Majority of participants reported had received counseling, but one third did not go for testing, condom use was low among positive clients. Recommendations Improvement of counseling sessions to pregnant women attending ANC at JTH is needed, as to increase their acceptance to services utilization. Doubling effort to achieve the goals of PMTCT among pregnant women is needed. Also there is a need of conducting a similar study at national level, as this study was conducted in JTH and it did not reflect or represent the other settings across the country.