IJAR - Indian Journal of Applied Research

Dr. Lovely Kumari; Dr.Abhishek Joshi; Dr.Vasant Wagh; Dr.Abhay Gaidhane; Dr.Kumar Bijyendra Sourabh

Volume : VII, Issue : X, October - 2017

Assessment of bacteriological quality of household water, its handling and storage practices among the residents of rural area of a tertiary care hospital.

Dr. Lovely Kumari, Dr. Abhishek Joshi, Dr. Vasant Wagh, Dr. Abhay Gaidhane, Dr. Kumar Bijyendra Sourabh

Abstract :

The world bank estimates 5% of all deaths are directly due to poor quality and 21% of communicable disease in India are linked to unsafe water and the lack of hygiene practices.Lack of safe drinking water, basic sanitation, and hygienic practices are associated with high morbidity and mortality. In the present study, after obtaining informed written consent from one of the family member of each household the information on socioeconomic status of the family, assessment of water hygiene and storage practices at household level was collected using a predesigned questionnaire. Then the drinking water sample was collected for the bacteriological examination. Out of all water samples only 15% were of excellent quality. Out of all households where there was bare (direct) hand contact at the time of fetching water, about 85% water sample was found to be suspicious or unsatisfactory and this association was found to be statistically highly significant (p–value< 0.001). Excellent or satisfactory sample were 96% where water was transferred from source to house in a covered container and 98% samples where drinking water was stored in a separate container covered with lid. 83% of all suspicious/unsatisfactory household water samples were not using filtration.