Maternal Healthcare Utilization among Women of Child Bearing Age Attending the Out-Patient Clinics of a Tertiary Health Facility Outstations in South-East, Nigeria

Abstract

Background: Most maternal deaths are preventable, as the healthcare solutions to prevent or manage complications are well known, yet  the global burden is still high in many developing countries, including Nigeria. Although access to healthcare services is the right of every  woman around the globe, irrespective of economic position and social group but there is still a low level of maternal health care seeking  behavior that is compounded by the extremely low skilled attendants especially in low and middle-income countries.

Objective: To assess  the maternal healthcare utilization among women of child-bearing ages attending out-patient clinics in all Nnamdi Azikiwe  University Teaching Hospital Outstations in Anambra State, SouthEast, Nigeria. Methodology: After obtaining approval from the ethics  and research committees in Nnamdi Azikiwe University Teaching Hospital, a cross-sectional survey of 300 consenting women who met  the eligibility criteria was conducted. They were selected by systematic random sampling from 15th February to 15th March, 2021. Data  collection was by the use of a self-administered structured questionnaire and analyzed using the statistical package for Social Sciences  (SPSS) version 20.0. The level of significance for this study was set at P < 0.05 for all analyses.

Results: A total of 300 women with a mean  age and standard deviation of 29.4±0.7 years participated in the study. The proportion of respondents who utilized the health care  facilities was 252 (84.67%), while 12.67% attended maternity homes and 2.66% preferred to stay at home.

Conclusion: Many women did  utilize the health care facilities and utilization was influenced by their level of education. Health awareness campaigns should be  conducted at the community level to raise the women's level of understanding about the importance of utilization of maternal health  services.