Postnatal health education in Nepal has little impact

Health education is widely promoted in primary care, but there have been few evaluations of its impact. In Nepal, Bolam et al (p 805) conducted a randomised controlled trial of postnatal health education for mothers by trained female health workers. The intervention had no significant impact on mothers' knowledge and practices of child care or on infant health, but there was a small increase in uptake of family planning at six months after birth. The authors suggest that the efficacy of interventions that rely solely on giving people information to change their behaviour is unproved.


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Relevant Article

The effects of postnatal health education for mothers on infant care and family planning practices in Nepal: a randomised controlled trial
Alison Bolam, Dharma S Manandhar, Purna Shrestha, Matthew Ellis, and Anthony M de L Costello
BMJ 1998 316: 805-811. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

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