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A novel banana fiber pad for menstrual hygiene in India: a feasibility and acceptability study
BACKGROUND: Menstrual hygiene products used by women have evolved in the past several decades with comfort, ease of use and cost driving women’s choices. In a country like India, where women form nearly 50% of the population, the sheer volume of periodic menstrual non-biodegradable waste generated h...
Autores principales: | , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
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BioMed Central
2021
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7995390/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33771134 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12905-021-01265-w |
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author | Achuthan, Krishnashree Muthupalani, Sharanya Kolil, Vysakh Kani Bist, Anju Sreesuthan, Krishna Sreedevi, Aswathy |
author_facet | Achuthan, Krishnashree Muthupalani, Sharanya Kolil, Vysakh Kani Bist, Anju Sreesuthan, Krishna Sreedevi, Aswathy |
author_sort | Achuthan, Krishnashree |
collection | PubMed |
description | BACKGROUND: Menstrual hygiene products used by women have evolved in the past several decades with comfort, ease of use and cost driving women’s choices. In a country like India, where women form nearly 50% of the population, the sheer volume of periodic menstrual non-biodegradable waste generated has significant environmental implications. With majority of the country hailing from low-middle class backgrounds, observing healthy menstrual hygiene practices with environmentally friendly products necessitates the consideration of affordable and highly sustainable alternatives. Further, during the COVID-19 pandemic, period poverty is higher than ever, causing women to turn to the reusable product market for affordable and long lasting alternatives. Hence, we studied the Feasibility and Acceptability (FA) of a novel banana fiber based menstrual pad (BFP) amongst women living in rural and urban environments. METHODS: The quantitative study of FA of the BFP was conducted amongst 155 rural and 216 urban participants in India. For greater authenticity of the FA study, we considered participants who used BFP for more than 4 months (Rural = 111 and Urban = 186) in the study. The survey data included responses from participants from Bihar, Delhi, Karnataka, Kerala, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal. A 22-item survey instrument was developed and validated using Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and reliability test (Cronback’s [Formula: see text] ). Binomial logistic regression analysis was used to analyse the factors that affect the FA of BFP based on the survey responses. In addition to survey analysis, environmental sustainability through [Formula: see text] footprint analysis, microbial load, pH and the ability of the BFP to withstand pressure after absorption were also studied. RESULTS: The results indicated high levels of feasibility (rural [Formula: see text] , urban [Formula: see text] and acceptability (rural [Formula: see text] , urban [Formula: see text] ) of BFPs across both participant groups. Comparing key BFP characteristics such as leakage and comfort to participants’ prior practices revealed general satisfaction on the performance of BFP, leading to them recommending BFPs to others. User perception on the reasons for their preference of BFP highlighted their concern for environment, health and cost as decisive factors. The microbial load on a 3 year reused BFP was found to be similar to an unused BFP. Regression analysis showed cost as an important indicator for feasibility ([Formula: see text] ; 95% CI = 1.083–3.248) and acceptability ([Formula: see text] ; 95% CI = 1.203–3.748) amongst rural participants. CONCLUSION: Based on feasibility and acceptability results, BFP is a promising consideration as an environmentally sound, non-invasive; yet reusable alternative to fulfil MHM needs in populous countries such as India. Longer term studies in larger samples are necessary to validate these findings. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12905-021-01265-w. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-7995390 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2021 |
publisher | BioMed Central |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-79953902021-03-26 A novel banana fiber pad for menstrual hygiene in India: a feasibility and acceptability study Achuthan, Krishnashree Muthupalani, Sharanya Kolil, Vysakh Kani Bist, Anju Sreesuthan, Krishna Sreedevi, Aswathy BMC Womens Health Research Article BACKGROUND: Menstrual hygiene products used by women have evolved in the past several decades with comfort, ease of use and cost driving women’s choices. In a country like India, where women form nearly 50% of the population, the sheer volume of periodic menstrual non-biodegradable waste generated has significant environmental implications. With majority of the country hailing from low-middle class backgrounds, observing healthy menstrual hygiene practices with environmentally friendly products necessitates the consideration of affordable and highly sustainable alternatives. Further, during the COVID-19 pandemic, period poverty is higher than ever, causing women to turn to the reusable product market for affordable and long lasting alternatives. Hence, we studied the Feasibility and Acceptability (FA) of a novel banana fiber based menstrual pad (BFP) amongst women living in rural and urban environments. METHODS: The quantitative study of FA of the BFP was conducted amongst 155 rural and 216 urban participants in India. For greater authenticity of the FA study, we considered participants who used BFP for more than 4 months (Rural = 111 and Urban = 186) in the study. The survey data included responses from participants from Bihar, Delhi, Karnataka, Kerala, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal. A 22-item survey instrument was developed and validated using Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and reliability test (Cronback’s [Formula: see text] ). Binomial logistic regression analysis was used to analyse the factors that affect the FA of BFP based on the survey responses. In addition to survey analysis, environmental sustainability through [Formula: see text] footprint analysis, microbial load, pH and the ability of the BFP to withstand pressure after absorption were also studied. RESULTS: The results indicated high levels of feasibility (rural [Formula: see text] , urban [Formula: see text] and acceptability (rural [Formula: see text] , urban [Formula: see text] ) of BFPs across both participant groups. Comparing key BFP characteristics such as leakage and comfort to participants’ prior practices revealed general satisfaction on the performance of BFP, leading to them recommending BFPs to others. User perception on the reasons for their preference of BFP highlighted their concern for environment, health and cost as decisive factors. The microbial load on a 3 year reused BFP was found to be similar to an unused BFP. Regression analysis showed cost as an important indicator for feasibility ([Formula: see text] ; 95% CI = 1.083–3.248) and acceptability ([Formula: see text] ; 95% CI = 1.203–3.748) amongst rural participants. CONCLUSION: Based on feasibility and acceptability results, BFP is a promising consideration as an environmentally sound, non-invasive; yet reusable alternative to fulfil MHM needs in populous countries such as India. Longer term studies in larger samples are necessary to validate these findings. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12905-021-01265-w. BioMed Central 2021-03-26 /pmc/articles/PMC7995390/ /pubmed/33771134 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12905-021-01265-w Text en © The Author(s) 2021 Open AccessThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Achuthan, Krishnashree Muthupalani, Sharanya Kolil, Vysakh Kani Bist, Anju Sreesuthan, Krishna Sreedevi, Aswathy A novel banana fiber pad for menstrual hygiene in India: a feasibility and acceptability study |
title | A novel banana fiber pad for menstrual hygiene in India: a feasibility and acceptability study |
title_full | A novel banana fiber pad for menstrual hygiene in India: a feasibility and acceptability study |
title_fullStr | A novel banana fiber pad for menstrual hygiene in India: a feasibility and acceptability study |
title_full_unstemmed | A novel banana fiber pad for menstrual hygiene in India: a feasibility and acceptability study |
title_short | A novel banana fiber pad for menstrual hygiene in India: a feasibility and acceptability study |
title_sort | novel banana fiber pad for menstrual hygiene in india: a feasibility and acceptability study |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7995390/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33771134 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12905-021-01265-w |
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