Menstruation: Medical Researcher, Bamidele Iwalokun Counsels On The Habit Of Using Tissue Paper As Sanitary Pad

Menstruation is a naturally occurring physiological condition in women. It is the process by which women shed blood and other material from the lining of the uterus (womb) at intervals of about one month from puberty until menopause except during pregnancy.

During menstruation, some women use toilet roll or tissue paper instead of sanitary pad. According to findings, some use it because they couldn’t afford sanitary pads while others use it for reasons best known to them.

When I started menstruating, I started with tissue paper because I couldn’t afford pads and over time, I became so comfortable with it and it took me some time before I started getting used to pads.

However a medical researcher, Bamidele Iwalokun, says the use of tissue paper as sanitary pads could lead to severe health complications.

Iwalokun, who is the head, Immunology and Vaccinology Research Department, Nigerian Institute of Medical Research (NIMR), Yaba, sounded this warning in an interview with News Agency of Nigeria, NAN. He said that some tissue papers were products of waste paper, and such tissue papers were not hygienic for draining blood during menstruation.

According to the medical expert,

“The habit of using tissue paper in form of sanitary pads is a poor hygiene practice on the part of any woman. Because no health policy has supported the use of tissue paper as sanitary pad, so it’s bad behaviour and should not be adopted health wise.

It doesn’t have any credibility of use. This should be a way of informing women that it carries a serious public health risk.

The practice places such women at risk of having an infection which may pass through the vagina cavity and enter the bloodstream, thereby having a serious health impact.”

The researcher said that the use of tissue paper during menstruation could affect the reproductive organs and that it could lead to other health complications.

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Sometimes it may be chronic infections that may not give serious symptoms to warrant going to the hospital, but it is indirectly damaging the reproductive system or that pathway.

One of them is the Pelvic Inflammatory Disease (PID), many women do not know they have PID until when issues of infertility come up and untreated PID is a major cause of infertility.

However, women should abstain from the practice of using tissue paper as sanitary pads, in order to avoid such health complications.

Women should always adopt proper hygiene at all times, especially during the monthly menstrual period.”