Introduction: Neonatal mortality has continued to increase as a percentage (>60%) of overall infant mortality. Any further reduction in infant mortality is dependent on saving more newborn lives. It is possible if their mothers are knowledgeable and provide proper newborn care. Therefore, the objective of the study was to find out knowledge and practice of the postnatal mothers about newborn care.Methods: A descriptive study was done among 100 purposively selected post natal mothers admitted in Teaching Hospital. Newborn care practice was observed among 20 mothers and comparison was done between knowledge and practice. Semi-structured interview questionnaire and observation checklist was used to collect the data. The descriptive statistics was used.Results: Respondents’ mean knowledge was on keeping newborn warm 44.2, on newborn care 47.2, on immunization 67.33, on danger signs 35.63. All (100%) respondents had have knowledge and practice to feed colostrums and exclusive breast feeding, 70 (70%) knew about early initiation of breastfeeding. Mean knowledge and practice of respondents was on measures to keep warm 8.5 and 17. Although 60 (60%) had knowledge to wash hands before breastfeeding, and after diaper care, only 10 (10%) followed it in practice. Mean practice of successful breast feeding was 37.5, 12 (60%) applied nothing kept cord dry. Conclusion: Postnatal mothers have adequate knowledge on areas like early, exclusive breast feeding, colostrums feeding, they have not much satisfactory knowledge in areas like hand washing, danger signs etc. While comparing knowledge with practice regarding newborn care, practice looks better in many areas._______________________________________________________________________________________Keywords: knowledge; newborn care; practice; postnatal mother.

Background: Preterm births are vulnerable to morbidities and require hospitalization in the neonatal care unit (NCU). The situation is stressful for mothers influencing their attachment and care to the newborns. Therefore, this study was conducted to explore the experience of mothers having preterm newborns in NCU. Methods: The qualitative study was conducted among purposively selected 13 mothers of NCU admitted preterm infants at Tribhuvan University, Teaching Hospital. Data was collected using in-depth interview. Colaizzi content analysis method was used for data analysis. Results: Among 13 mothers, 8 were primipara, 25-30 years, homemakers; 6 had Bachelor or above education; 11 had ANC visit > 4 times. Ten infants were very preterm (< 32 weeks gestational age), 11 have very low birth weight (< 1500 gram), 9 born by caesarian section and stayed NICU for 7-14 days. Study identified 5 themes and 18 subthemes: loss of control (fear and anxiety, distress towards pain and suffering, guilt feeling, hopelessness); sense of difference (newborn’s appearance, needs and problems, breastfeeding and parental roles); care of newborn (trust to nurses, confidence and emotional attachment with care involvement,), support for coping (support from family, nurses and other mothers); and difficulties faced (distance to NCU, inadequate guidance and information, and lack of supportive environment) Conclusion: The hospitalization of preterm newborns in NCUs was usually stressful situation for mothers. Their positive experience and coping was related with provided guidance support and involvement in newborn care. Therefore, nurses working in NCU should consider these care components in their practice.

Introduction: Many reproductive aged women needlessly die due to unsafe abortion even when they seek help to terminate their unwanted pregnancy. These deaths could have been prevented had they been aware that safe abortion service was available to them. The study aimed at finding out the effectiveness of the education intervention in improving knowledge among reproductive age group women regarding the safe abortion. Methods: An experimental intervention was carried out on safe abortion education among the reproductive age group women. The impact of pre- and post- intervention was evaluated by using a set of structured questionnaire in local language. The obtained data was analyzed by using the Excel and Statistical Package for the Social Sciences, version 12.0 for windows and result was interpreted. Results: The post intervention finding revealed a significantly higher (p= 0.001) mean on knowledge among participants about safe abortion compared to pre-observational test. The mean difference between the pre-test and post-test was 64.1% (Pre-test 11.18 ±12.88 Post-test 75.28 ±9.56). The research hypothesis was accepted with p value paired t-test at <0.001 (0.05). The result supports that the educational intervention was effective in increasing safe abortion awareness among reproductive aged group women. Conclusion: The safe abortion educational intervention program was instrumental to improve reproductive age women’s knowledge considerably about safe abortion service.  Keywords: educational intervention; knowledge; safe abortion; women.  

Sickle cell diseases are inherited hematological diseases, prevalent in certain parts of the world. We reporttwo cases of sickle cell diseases, first being sickle cell b-thalassaemia and second homozygous sickle celldisease (SS). Our first case was 5 year old boy presenting with hemolytic anaemia & hepatosplenomegalyhaving sickle cell b-thalassaemia disease . Second case was 17 years female presenting with hemolyticanaemia & joint pain having homozygous sickle cell disease.Key Words: Homozygous sickle cell disease, sickle cell b - thalassaemia, hemoglobin electrophoresis.

Introduction Fetal growth abnormalities are common complications of diabetes in pregnancy; there is little data on temporal trends in growth disturbance. Aim To determine changes in rate of large for gestational age (LGA) and small for gestational age (SGA) in babies of women with pre-gestational Type 1 or Type 2 diabetes (T1DM and T2DM). Methods Data were extracted from the Northern Diabetes in Pregnancy Survey, a register of pregnancies in women with pre-gestational diabetes resident in Northern England. We studied 1499 singleton live births delivered 1996–2008, excluding those with congenital anomalies. LGA was defined as birtweight >90th percentile for gestational age and SGA as<10th percentile, corrected for infant sex and parity. Results 1164 (78%) women had T1DM and 328 (22%) T2DM; T2DM increased from 8.9% (1996–2000) to 32.1% (2005–2008) (p=0.01). Mean (SD) birth weight was 3437 g (±755). 335 (23%) babies weighed ≥4000 g. The rate of LGA was 49.3% and SGA 2.9% and did not change over time (LGA 50.9%, 1996–2000, 47.7%, 2005–2008; SGA 3.5%, 1996–2000, 2.9%, 2005–2008; p=0.73). LGA babies were more likely to be preterm (60.3% vs 37.2%, p=0.001), delivered by caesarean section (53.5% vs 43.3%, p=0.001), admitted to special care (56.5% vs 40.7%, p=0.001) and to develop shoulder dystocia (85.7% vs 11.9%, p= 0.001) than babies of normal weight for gestational age. Conclusion Rates of LGA and SGA have not changed over time despite an increase in T2DM.