Knowledge, attitude and practice of maternal exercise among pregnant mothers attending primary health care centres in Jos Metropolis, Plateau State, Nigeria

The purpose of the study was to determine the level of Knowledge, attitude and practice of maternal exercise among pregnant mothersattending Primary Health Care Centres in Jos Metropolis, Plateau State, Nigeria. To achieve the purpose of the study, three research objectives were formulated with three corresponding research questions and two hypotheses postulated to guide the study. Literatures pertinent to the study were reviewed. The study used a descriptive Cross-sectional research design which was suitable for this study. The target population for the study comprised all pregnant mothers attending Antenatal Clinics within Jos metropolis. The sample size for the study was 150 pregnant mothers gotten through purposive sampling technique. The instrument used for data collection was researchers developed structured questionnaire made up of four sections. Section A consisted of questions on demographic characteristic of the respondents, B consisted of questions on level of knowledge, C consisted of questions on attitude of respondent towards maternal exercise and D consisted of questions on level of practice of maternal exercise.The data were collected with the help of the research assistants and were cross-checked for completeness of the information.The data collected were analyzed using frequency counts and percentages and were presented in Tables. Chi-square statistics was used to test the null hypothesis at 0.05 level of significant. The results revealed that pregnant mothers knowledge level concerning maternal exercise was high, their attitude towards maternal exercise was reasonably positive and their level of practice was moderate during pregnancy. The study recommended among others that expectant mothers were encouraged to share the knowledge of maternal exercise with their colleagues for healthy pregnancy and the community members were health educated on the importance of maternal exercise for pregnant mothers during pregnancy.