Self-Care Practice and Associated Factors Among Postpartum Mothers at Karat Town, Konso Zone, Southern, Ethiopia: 2022

Abstract Background: Self-care practice after delivery plays a crucial role in achieving maternal health coverage by having a healthy mother and newborn. It’s a one way of reducing health problem and its complication during the postpartum period. Objectives: To assess level of postpartum self-care practice and associated factors among mothers at Karat Town, Konso Zone, Southern, Ethiopia, 2022. Methods A community-based cross-sectional study was conducted in Karat town among 419 study participants from August 1 to September 15, 2022. A systematic random sampling was employed to select each study participant from each kebeles. Data was collected using structured questionnaire by face to face interview. The collected data were cleaned, coded, and entered into Epi-data version 4.6 and was exported to statistical package for social science version 25 for analysis. Multivariate logistic regression was carried out for variables with a p-value <0.25 in bivariate logistic regression to determine significant associations between the outcome and independent variables. The statistical significance was determined using 95% confidence interval with a p<0.05. Finally, the results were presented with text, tables, figure and graph. Results: Overall, level of postpartum self-care practice of mothers was 33.4%. Having antenatal care visit (adjusted odds ratio=2.82; 95% confidence interval=1.394-5.709),Institutional delivery (adjusted odds ratio =2.42; 95%confidence interval =1.18-4.93), accompanied husband in antenatal care (adjusted odds ratio=2.41; 95% confidence interval=1.37-4.24), counseling by healthcare providers during home visit (adjusted odds ratio=2.28; 95% confidence interval =1.24-4.19) and healthcare provider counseling at discharge (adjusted odds ratio=3.25; 95% confidence interval=1.72-6.13),knowledge of participants (adjusted odds ratio=3.61; 95% confidence interval=2.11-6.19) were factors significantly associated with postpartum self-care. Conclusion: Only about one third of participants had good postpartum self-care practice. Therefore, Inspiring pregnant mothers to use antenatal care, institutional delivery services, accompanied husbands in antenatal care, counseling by healthcare providers during home visit, strengthening providers counseling on postpartum self-care at discharge, and enhancing knowledge about postpartum self-care would be improve the postpartum self-care practice.