Knowledge of neonatal danger signs and associated factors among husbands of mothers who gave birth in the last 6 months in Gurage Zone, Southern Ethiopia, 2020: a community-based cross-sectional study

OBJECTIVE: To assess knowledge of neonatal danger signs and their associations among husbands of mothers who gave birth in the last 6 months in Gurage Zone, Southern Ethiopia, from 1 February to 28 February 2020. DESIGN: Community-based cross-sectional study. SETTING: Gurage Zone, Southern Ethiopia. PARTICIPANTS: The study was conducted among 633 participants living in Gurage Zone from 1 February to 28 February 2020. 618 completed the questionnaire. A multistage sampling technique was employed to obtain study participants. Data were collected through face-to-face interviews conducted by 20 experienced and trained data collectors using a pretested structured questionnaire. To assess knowledge, 10 questions were adopted from the WHO questionnaire, which is a standardised and structured questionnaire used internationally. Data were entered into EpiData V.3.1 and exported to SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences) V.24 for analysis. Descriptive statistics were performed and the findings were presented in text, figures and tables. Binary logistic regression was used to assess the association between each independent variable and the outcome variable. All variables with p<0.25 in the bivariate analysis were included in the final model and statistical significance was declared at p<0.05. Voluntary consent was taken from all participants. RESULTS: A total of 618 participants were included in the study, with a response rate of 97.6%. Of the participants, 40.7% had good knowledge (95% CI 36.3 to 44.2). Urban residence (adjusted OR=6.135, 95% CI 4.429 to 9.238) and a primary and above educational level (adjusted OR=4.294, 95% CI 1.875 to 9.831) were some independent predictors of husbands’ knowledge status. CONCLUSION: Knowledge of neonatal danger signs in this study was low. Urban residence, primary and above educational level, the husband’s wife undergoing instrumental delivery and accompanying the wife during antenatal care visits were independent predictors of knowledge. Thus, strong multisectoral collaboration should target reducing the knowledge gap by improving husbands’ attitude with regard to accompanying their wives during antenatal care and postnatal care visits, or create a strategy to increase husbands’ participation in access to maternal and child health service since husbands are considered decision-makers when it comes to healthcare-seeking in the family. The government should come up with policies that will help promote formal education in the community and increase their media access.