Awareness, Acceptability, and Feasibility of the Menstrual Cup: A Descriptive Study

Background: A menstrual cup is a menstrual hygiene device which is inserted into the vagina, made of silicone can be reused for 10 yrs.Today in the era of reduce, reuse and recycle, menstrual cup provides a suitable, safe, and feasible option for sustainable menstruation.This study aimed to assess the awareness, acceptability, and feasibility of menstrual cup among student population.Materials and methods: A descriptive longitudinal study done including the female medical and dental undergraduates.All eligible participants consenting to participate were provided with a predesigned questionnaires.The data collected were entered in MS Excel and analyzed into descriptive statistics like percentages.Results: 462 female students received the questionnaire, out of which 459 completed the questionnaire.Of the total participants, 93.5% were aware of the cup as a menstrual sanitary product with social media as the leading source of information (75%).In the study, 5.9% were active cup users.The main reason cited for not using the cup was lack of information regarding the correct insertion and removal techniques (45%) and the fear of insertion (31%).Among the cup users, the common problem faced was difficulty in insertion and removal (66.6%), while 46% of the users did not face any problems or difficulties with usage of the cup.About 75% of the non-users showed a willingness to change over to cup. Conclusion:From our study, it can be inferred that though the awareness regarding availability and safety of the cup is on the rise in the last few years, the popularity is still low.Thus, more awareness programs regarding proper usage technique, safety, and additional benefits of the menstrual cup needs to be arranged particularly focusing on the student population.