An Analytical Study of Socio Economic Status of Teenage Mothers

 

Dr. Bhagwan Gamaji Ambhore1* and Dr. Rathi H.B.2

1Assistant Professor, Dept. of Community Medicine, Dr. Ulhas Patil Medical College, Jalgaon Khurd (M.S.)

2Associate Professor, Dept. of Community Medicine, Dr. Ulhas Patil Medical College and Hospital, Jalgaon Khurd (M.S.)

 

 

ABSTRACT:

Background: In any community, teen age pregnancy is associated with culture of poverty and deprivation. Teen age mother hood is a problem of all segments of society. Objective: To know the association of socio economic status and teen age mothers if any. Material and methods:  Two hundred and nine teen age women who delivered in a tertiary care hospital taken as sample. Socio economic status decided by modified B.G. Prasad's classification. Findings: More than 90 % women belong to Lower middle and upper middle class. There was not a single case from Upper class. Conclusion and recommendations: In the lower socio economic group daughters are considered as transitory members of family and financial burden on family, so they marry their daughters as early as possible to get free from this burden. The phenomenon of early marriage is highly related to schooling of girls hence authors suggest that irrespective of caste, religion, socio economic status, each girl must be given fees free education to the highest level including medical and technical etc.

 

KEYWORDS: Education, Socio economic status

 

INTRODUCTION:

In any community, teen-age pregnancy is associated with culture, poverty and deprivation. Teen-age mother hood is a problem of all segments of society. In the low socio-economic groups and in rural areas of developing or under developed countries including India, most of the teen age girls are illiterate which limits the power, she has in the family. By keeping in mind the above facts and as per recommendations of the World Health Organization (W.H.O.) study group in 1957, that in order to get a comprehensive picture of a disease/health problem, more and more such studies have to be carried out, Garg Narenra K.(2) and Garg Narenra K.and Sharma A.B.(3), the authors have under taken this study with the objective to study of socio economic status of teen age mothers

 

MATERIALS AND METHOD:

This study is retrospective in nature carried out from 1st August 2001 to 31ST July 2002. Two hundred and nine teen-age mothers delivered in Shri Chhatrapati Shivagi Maharaj General Hospital, Solapur (M.S.) were taken as sample. All the sampled women were interviewed and the information was collected in a predawn and pretested proforma. The mothers were interviewed in Marathi and Hindi. There were some Kannada speaking mothers for them, assistance of translator was taken. All  possible efforts were made to achieve validity, authenticity and completeness of the information.

 

 

 

 

Socio economic status was decided by modified B.G. Prasad's classification.

 

B.G. Prasad's economic classification was adopted and modified as per all India consumer price index (AICPI) for the month of January, 2002. AICPI for the month of January was 467 (base 1982=100)

Steps in modification

 

Step- i

Formula for deriving multiplication factor (M.F.)

             Value of AICPI  X  4.93

M.F.= -------------------------------------

                            100

=   467  X  4.93

          100

=  23.0231

 

Step-ii

Multiply original income limits with multiplication factor and round the product to nearest five rupees.

 

TABLE-I

B.G. Prasad's economic classification modified as per AICPI for the month of  January, 2002

Social class

Per capita monthly income limits in Rs.

 

Prasad's classification 1961

Modified for January, 2002

I upper

100 and above

2305 and above

II upper middle

50 – 99

1150 – 2304

III lower middle

30 – 49

690 – 1149

IV upper lower

15 – 29

345 – 689

V lower

Below 15

Below 345

 

OBSERVATIONS AND DISCUSSION:

On analysis of the collected data it was found that there was not a single mother belongs to upper class (Table-II). Table further reveals that 127 (60.76%) women belong to upper lower and 63 (30.14%) from lower middle class while only 12(05.74%) and 07 (03.36%) belong to upper middle and lower socio economic status respectively.

 

Philips F.S. et al (3) reported in their study that majority of adolescent pregnant mothers belonged to poor socio economic group. Osbourne G.K. et al (4) found in their study that 82% teen age mothers belong to social class iv and v and very few from class I and II. Pal A. et al (5) observed that there were 12.5 % teen age mothers each from class I and II, 27.5 % from class III, 21.2 %and 26 % were from class IV and V respectively.

 

TABLE-II

DISTRIBUTION OF TEEN AGE MOTHERS AS PER THEIR SOCIO ECONOMIC STATUS     n=209

Socio economic status

Number

Percentage

I Upper

NIL

00.00

II Upper middle

12

05.74

III Lower middle

63

30.14

IV Upper lower

127

60.76

V Lower Lower

07

03.36

Total

209

100.00

Behra R.C. et al (6) in their prospective 5 years study noted that 62.5% of adolescent pregnant women were from lower socio economic and 31.25 % from middle. P. Reddi Rani (7) found that 77 % teen age mothers were from lower socio economic class. The findings of the present study and those of others were found more or less comparable.  

 

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS:

In the lower socio economic group daughters are considered as transitory members of family and financial burden on family, daughters are not expected to support themselves or their aged parents in later life and benefit that does arise from education will be reaped by their marital households. So they marry their daughters as early as possible to get free from this burden. The phenomenon of early marriage is highly related to schooling of girls hence authors suggest that irrespective of caste, religion, socio economic status, each girl must be given fees free education to the highest level including medical and technical etc. Then only teen age marriage will be prohibited.

 

REFERENCES:

1.       Garg Narendra K.: Evaluation of the impact of emesis and emesis plus purgation Therapy; Research J Pharmacology and Pharmacodynamics:2 (2) March-April;2010:201-202.

2.       Garg Narendra K and Sharma A.B. : Epidemiological profile of patients attending a tertiary care hospital,Muktsar,Punjab (India); Research J Pharmacology and Pharmacodynamics:3 (6) November-December;2011:311-317

3.       Philips F.S. and Shivkamsundari S., Teenage Pregnancy; J. Obst. Gynaec. Ind. 28 (4);578,1978

4.       Osbourne G.K., Howet R.C.L, Jordan MM.,The Obstetric outcome of pregnancy; Brit. J. Obst.Gynaec. , 88: 215, 1981

5.       Pal A.,Gupta K. Randhwa I., Adolescent pregnancy : A high risk group; J.Ind. Med. Asso., 95 (5):127,1997

6.       Behra R.C.and Padte Kedar, Unmarried teen age pregnancy, multifocal and multidimensiol medico social, Problem: A prospective study of 80 cases; J. Obst. Gynaec. Ind. 39 :130: 1989

7.       P. Reddi Rani, Rani U., Raghwan S., Rajaram P. Adolescent pregnancy; J. Obstet. Gynaec. Ind., 42 :764,1958

 

 

Received on 02.04.2013

Modified on 06.05.2013

Accepted on 12.05.2013

© A&V Publication all right reserved

Research J. Pharmacology and Pharmacodynamics. 5(3): May–June 2013, 186-186