A health expert at the Sunyani Municipal Health Directorate, Mrs. Monica Danso, has advised women and girls to change sanitary pads every four to six hours during menstruation to maintain proper vaginal health.

She said doing that would help reduce the risk of getting Urinal Tract Infections (UTI) and incidence of rashes in the genital organ.

Mrs. Danso, an Assistant Staff Midwife at the Family Planning Unit of the Directorate, gave the advice in an interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in Sunyani, saying practicing good menstrual hygiene during menstruation ensured good reproductive health and helped to minimise the risk of getting cervical cancer.

‘Desist from wearing sanitary pads for more than four hours during menstruation and wash yourself properly and regularly to reduce the increasing vulnerability to reproductive tract infections,’ Mrs. Danso stated.

She explained ‘during such periods a person should stay away from douching, smoking, taking a lot of caffeine and eating a lot of salted foods which could worsen or discomfort the body from cramps.’

Mrs Danso added females in menstrual period needed to wash their hands properly after removing wet sanitary pads to prevent other infections which might affect their health.

She said to practice good menstrual hygiene, the person must wrap the used sanitary pad nicely in a polyethene bag and either burn or dispose it in a pit but not be exposed to other people around in the environment to affect their health.

Mrs Danso appealed to schools, institutions, and organisations to ensure the availability of proper places of convenience for girls and women to dispose their menstrual hygiene materials because it had become a serious issue affecting the lives of people.

She said matters of such nature needed to be discussed in schools and in the media to assist girl-children with ways they could take care of themselves hygienically during their menstrual periods.

Source: Ghana News Agency