Socio-demographic determinants of choice of delivery place among antenatal women attending health facilities in Eleme Local Government Area, Rivers State

Abstract

This study investigated the socio-demographic determinants of choice of delivery place among antenatal women attending health facilities in Eleme Local Government Area. Four research questions and four hypotheses guided the study. The research design adopted for this study was a descriptive research design with a population of 134,100 women of childbearing age. A multistage sampling procedure was adopted to select a sample size of 440. The instrument for data collection in this study was a structured questionnaire with a reliability coefficient of 0.718. The finding of the study showed that the choice of delivery place among women was healthcare facility 226 (55.5%), which was chosen more among women who were single, those with fewer number of children, younger women within 20-24 years and those who resided in the semi-urban environs. The result revealed that there was a significant relationship between choice of delivery place and marital status (X²- value = 24.12, df = 12, P < 0.05). It was concluded that the socio-demographic determinants of their choice were marital status, parity, age and location. It was recommended that health professionals should increase their campaign on maternal health with more emphasis on health facility delivery among women.