Neonatal deaths remain to be a concern in the Philippines. In response to the dilemma, the Department of Health devised the Essential Newborn Care Protocol containing the four core steps of immediate newborn care. The birth attendants of the municipalities of Aurora, Tambulig, Tukuran and Ramon Magsaysay were educated and trained regarding this protocol however gaps in the implementation of the four core steps of immediate newborn care were still observed. Objective: This study was conducted to determine the effectiveness of lecture and demonstration on the knowledge, attitude and practices on the four core steps of immediate newborn care of the facility based birth attendants of selected municipalities of Zamboangadel Sur. Methods: A pre and post intervention research design was utilized. All thirty-one respondents were recruited utilizing total sampling. A self-administered questionnaire was given to the respondents to assess knowledge, attitude and practices. The actual practices were observed utilizing a checklist. To measure knowledge improvement, ANOVA for repeated measures was utilized. The results revealed significant improvement of the mean knowledge scores from21.194 in the pre intervention to 24.968 in post-intervention 1 with the p value of 0.000 and 24.710 in post intervention 2with P value of 0.000. The assessment of attitude was done utilizing paired T-test. All the attitude items showed statistically significant improvement after the intervention. The self-evaluation of the respondents on their practices items were analysed utilizing Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test and McNemar’s test was utilized to analyse the actual observed practices The results revealed statistically significant improvements in the post-intervention 2 on items related immediate and thorough drying with the p value of 0.002 and non-separation of the newborn and the mother for early breastfeeding with the p value of 0.001. Conclusion: Lecture and demonstration was an effective health education strategy in improving the knowledge, attitude and practices on the four core steps of immediate newborn care of the birth attendants.

Keyword: neonatal deaths newborn care maternal and child health