Management of Menstrual Hygiene

Menstruation is a normal part of growing up for a girl. Once her body becomes able to reproduce, a small amount of blood leaves the body through the vagina for a few days almost every month. This is called menstruation, or a period. It is not an illness, and it is nothing to be ashamed of. It is a natural and regular process of a healthy body.

Even so, religious beliefs and many misconceptions about menstruation are still common in some communities. These misconceptions make it harder for a woman to stay clean and comfortable during her period, and so they affect her health. For this reason, a girl or woman needs to take more care than usual of her personal cleanliness while she is menstruating.

A girl does not stop living her life during her period. She still goes to school, lives with her family and spends time with her friends. So staying clean and healthy at this time is not her job alone. She needs support from her school, her teachers, her family and her friends.

Hygiene during a period is more than washing. The things a girl needs to stay clean must also be available at the right time. Without clean material to soak up the blood, a private place to change it, soap and water to wash with, and a proper way to get rid of what has been used, she cannot stay clean however much she wants to. Making sure all of these are in place is what we call menstrual hygiene management.

This definition is made up of four parts:

• Clean materials to soak up the blood: a clean cloth, a pad made at home, or a pad bought from the market
• A private place to change the used material
• Soap and water for cleaning the genitals and the hands
• A facility for dealing with the used material

A student spends about 6 hours of each day at school. If her period comes during those hours, she has to manage it there, away from home. That is why the school has an important part to play in the hygiene of girls who are menstruating. A school can help in these ways:

• Provide safe toilets with a latch on the door for girl students and women teachers, with a facility for disposing of pads, called an incinerator, attached to the toilet
• Arrange water and soap so that girls can wash their genitals and their hands
• Keep pads at school for a girl whose period starts suddenly
• Set up a fund at school to pay for the materials needed for menstrual hygiene
• Hold orientation programmes from time to time that give the information needed for managing menstruation
• Where possible, provide a rest room for girls during menstruation and in other difficult situations
• Arrange for a health worker's advice to be available at school when period pain is so severe that medicine has to be taken

Look at what these arrangements do together. A latch gives privacy. Water and soap make cleaning possible. Spare pads and a fund mean that a sudden period does not leave a girl stuck. A rest room and a health worker's advice mean that pain does not have to cut her school day short. Orientation programmes help everyone understand why these facilities are there.

The school and the family can provide facilities, but using them well is the work of girls and women themselves. During her period, a girl or woman must take special care of her health and pay attention to her own cleanliness. Her role can be understood in three groups.

First, keeping clean:

• Bathe every day during the period and wear clean clothes
• Use a pad, or a pad made at home from cotton cloth, to soak up the blood
• Change the pad as needed, or every 4 or 5 hours, and wash the hands well with soap and water after changing it
• If cloth is used as a pad, wash it well with soap and water after use and dry it in open sunlight
• When buying a pad from the market, check its expiry date before using it, and after use either bury it in a pit or put it only in an incinerator

Second, eating, drinking and resting well:

• Drink plenty of water and other liquids during the period, such as hot water, lentil soup, milk and curd
• If the body aches, do light exercise, soak the feet in hot water, or warm the belly with a rubber hot water bag
• Avoid heavy work and long journeys during the period

Third, talking openly and helping others:

• Accept menstruation as a natural process, talk about it without fear with women who have already started their periods, such as a mother, an elder sister or a brother's wife, and take help from the male members of the family too, without feeling shy
• Discuss with friends the facilities the school has for menstruation, and spread this information in the community as well

There is a reason for drying a cloth pad in open sunlight. In the sun the cloth dries completely, and a damp cloth is not clean enough to use again. In the same way, checking the expiry date before opening a bought pad is a small habit, but it stops an old product from being used.

Home is usually the first place where a girl hears and learns about menstruation. That is why the family has an important part in menstrual hygiene management. A family should do the following:

• Give their children knowledge about menstruation in advance, before it begins
• Share their own experiences of menstruation
• Remove superstitions about menstruation and give correct information and proper advice at the right time
• Create a home where children feel free to talk about their problems, and understand and deal with those problems properly
• Give time to rest during the period and pay special attention to food and drink
• Help with using pads and managing them properly, and give advice on keeping personal hygiene
• Provide water, soap, pads and other materials during the period

These are not only the jobs of a mother or an elder sister. A father, brothers and other male members of the family can also bring the materials she needs, let her rest and help make a home where nobody is embarrassed. When a family makes a girl feel at ease, she does not hide her problems.

At school, it is the teachers who give girls the knowledge they need for menstrual hygiene management. Teachers can play these roles:

• Give girls at school the knowledge and information they need to be prepared for menstruation
• Create an atmosphere in which menstruation can be talked about openly
• Organise interactions on menstrual hygiene management between adolescent girls from different schools
• Run awareness programmes to reduce the wrong beliefs and practices about menstruation found in the community

A teacher's work does not stop at the classroom door. When girls get the chance to share experiences with girls from other schools, they learn that they are not alone. When teachers run awareness programmes in the community, wrong practices at home also slowly decrease.

No single person can manage menstrual hygiene alone. The table below sums up what each of the four does.

When the school provides facilities, the family gives support, teachers share knowledge and the girl herself is aware and careful, menstruation stops being a matter of fear or shame. It becomes an ordinary part of a healthy life.