Improving the Knowledge and Attitude on 'Standard Days Method' of Family Planning Through a Promotional Program Among Indian Postgraduate Students.

INTRODUCTION: The 'Standard Days Method' is a fertility awareness-based method of family planning that identifies day 8 through day 19 of the menstrual cycle as fertile days during which a woman is likely to conceive with unprotected intercourse.

OBJECTIVE: The study was aimed to determine the effectiveness of a promotional program on the 'Standard Days Method' in terms of improving the knowledge scores and attitude scores.

DESIGN: A pre-experimental one-group pretest-posttest research design was adopted. The samples included 365 female postgraduate students from selected colleges of Udupi Taluk, Karnataka. The data was collected using self-administered questionnaires. The plan for the promotional program was also established.

RESULTS: The findings of the study were analyzed using the descriptive and inferential statistics. The mean pretest and posttest knowledge scores were computed, and it was found that there was an increase in the mean knowledge score from 8.96 ± 3.84 to 32.64 ± 5.59, respectively. It was observed that the promotional program on 'Standard Days Method' was effective in improving the knowledge ( p  < 0.001) and attitude ( p  < 0.001) of the postgraduate students.

CONCLUSION: The promotional program on Standard Days Method of family planning was effective in improving the knowledge and attitude of the postgraduate female students. This will enable the women to adopt this method and plan their pregnancies naturally and reduce the side effects of using oral contraceptives.