Dr Abhay

Profile of awareness about responsibilities and involvement in activities of ASHA

workers of Community Development Block Kalyanpur, Kanpur

Abhay Singh, S.C. Saxena, V.K. Srivastava, D. S. Martolia,

Punit Varma, R. P. Sharma

INTRODUCTION• National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) was launched in

April, 2005 with a commitment to provide effective health care to the rural population throughout the country. ASHA as the grass root health activist is to facilitate primary health care, ante-natal care, post-natal care, hygiene, advice on sanitation and escorting expectant mothers to hospitals for safe delivery at the village level for effective contribution towards endeavour to reduce maternal mortality which is still quite high in spite of many health programmes and schemes.

• NRHM envisaged the capacity of ASHA through training and motivating them on a performance based compensation. The minimum preferable educational qualification for these ASHAs has been fixed 8th class passed and must be a resident and “Bahu” (daughter-in-law) of the village for which they are selected.

Contd.

• These ASHAs are expected to fulfill the social gap in between potential beneficiaries of the services and regular and health care health functionaries such as ANM, AWW etc, being local resident of the area it is expected that activism of ASHAs will enhance the utilization of various health care facilities and acceptable platform will be available for informal counseling services.

• To accomplish the expected task it is necessary to find out the level of awareness among ASHAs about their job responsibilities and the level of their involvement in assigned duties, so as to evaluate the need for reorientation of their training, the present study has been planned.

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

• To assess the bio-social characteristics of ASHAs.

• To analyse awareness regarding job responsibilities.

• To find out their involvement in assigned activities.

MATERIAL AND METHODS• Study Design: Cross sectional. • Study Period: April 2009 to March 2010.• Study Subject: Accredited Social Health Activist (ASHA). • Statistical Analysis: Percentage and Chi-square test.• Methodology: District Kanpur comprises of 10 community

development blocks (CDBs), out of which 1 CDB Kalayanpur was selected by using simple random sampling technique. The selected CDB Kalayanpur consists of 1 CHC and 4 PHCs. All 135 ASHAs working in all the above CHC and PHCs have been studied in total. Anyhow 7 ASHAs could not be studied as they were non-functional and were not available for the study. These 135 ASHAs were interviewed at their work place and the required data was collected on predesigned and pretested questionnaire.

Table-1Distribution of ASHAs according to their Bio-Social

characteristicsBio-social

CharacteristicsNumber Percentage

AGE GROUP (yrs)25-30 11 8.130-35 61 45.235-40 54 40.040-45 9 6.7

Total 135 100.0RELIGIONHindu 134 99.3Muslim 1 0.7Christian 0 0Sikh 0 0

Total 135 100.0

Contd.CASTESC 34 25.2OBC 73 54.1General 28 20.7

Total 135 100.0EDUCATIONMiddle 78 57.8High School 31 23.0Intermediate 18 13.3Graduate 8 5.9

Total 135 100.0SOCIAL CLASS (according to modified B.G Prasad Classification,AICPI, April 2010)*III 41 30.4IV 93 68.9V 1 0.7

Total 135 100.0

Table-2

Awareness about responsibilities of ASHAs ASHA’s job responsibilies Number Percentage

Creating community awareness 135 100Counseling on safe deliveries, ANC,

PNC & breast feeding135 100

Motivate the community for constructing sanitary toilets

129 95.6

Co-ordination with village health committee

127 94.1

Utilization of health services 125 92.6Depot holders of medicines and

providing DOTS121 89.6

Counseling of RTIs/STIs 117 86.7

Table-3

AGE GROUP WISE AWARENESS REGARDING RTIs/STIs PROFILE OF ASHAs (n=135)

Age Group ofASHAs

AWARENESS REGARDING RTIs/STIs

AgeGroup

Number YES NONumber Percentage Number Percentage

25-30 11 9 81.2 2 18.230-35 61 51 83.61 10 16.3935-40 54 47 87.00 7 13.0040-45 9 9 100 0 0Total 135 113 83.7 22 16.3

2=18.95, C.I=95%, df=3 & p<0.05

Table-4Activities performed by ASHAs

Activities of ASHAs YESNumber %

ANC registration 135 100Counseling on safe deliveries, ANC, PNC 135 100

Accompany pregnant mother to hospital 135 100

Distribution of IFA/OCPs 135 100Inform ANM/AWW on births & deaths/Inform ANM for Immunization

135 100

Motivate the community for Constructing sanitary toilets

128 94.8

Distribution of ORS 125 92.6Educating adolescents for RTIs/STIs 123 91.1Inform AWW in supplementary nutritional feeding

79 58.5

Table-5EDUCATION AND EDUCATING ADOLESCENTS

FOR RTIs/STIs WISE PROFILE OF ASHAs

Education Educating RTIs/STIs TotalYes No

Middle 71(91.0)

7(9.0)

78(100)

High School 26(83.9)

5(16.1)

31(100)

Intermediate 18(100)

0(0)

18(100)

Graduate 8(100)

0(0)

8(100)

Total 123(91.1)

12(8.9)

135(100)

TABLE-6EDUCATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF

ORS WISE PROFILE IF ASHAs

2=8.67, C.I=95%, df=3 & p<0.05

Education Distribution of ORS Total

Yes NoMiddle 71(91.0) 7(9.0) 78(100)High School 29(93.4) 2(6.6) 31(100)Intermediate 17(94.4) 1(5.6) 18(100)Graduate 8(100) 0(0) 8(100)Total 125(92.6) 10(7.4) 135(100)

CONCLUSIONS

• Majority of studied ASHAs were in age group 30-35years, Hindu by religion, OBC by caste, educated upto middle standard and social class IV.

• Social class III ASHAs were proportionately better educated.• Scheduled caste ASHAs were relatively less educated than OBC

and general caste ASHAs.• Lower social class was more prevalent in Scheduled caste ASHAs.• ASHAs were found performing most of their assigned job

resposibilities.• Awareness about RTIs/STIs related job responsibilities was

relatively low in younger age group of ASHAs but mature aged ASHAs were fully sensitised for this job responsibilities.

• Intermediate and above level educated ASHAs were performing their resposibilities for educating adolescent females towards RTIs/STIs.

• Higher educated (graduate) ASHAs were perfectly distributing ORS with decline in perfection with decline in education.

Thank

you