Family planning services in a tertiary hospital in a semi-urban area of south-western Nigeria: Uptake and determinants of contraceptive use

Abstract

An audit of 954 family planning clinic attendees, who received counselling from 2006 to 2010, was conducted at the only federal government owned tertiary hospital in Ondo state, Nigeria. Of these, 637 (66.8%) accepted a family planning method: 47.6% chose injectables, 23.2% intrauterine device, 19.5% oral contraceptive pills, 4.4% barrier methods, 3.3% implants and 2% tubal ligation. Clients who had some primary education [OR: 2.79; (95% CI: 1.14–6.84; p < 0.05] had statistically significant higher odds of accepting any contraceptive method while those with elevated blood pressure at first visit [OR: 0.23; 95% CI: 0.12–0.45; p < 0.001] and those with previous episode(s) of induced abortion OR: 0.57; 95% CI: 0.43–0.76; p < 0.001] had statistically significant lower odds of using any method. Concerted efforts at increasing uptake is advocated to bridge the gap between client counselling and uptake.

Keywords:

• Family planning
• Nigeria
• semi-urban
• uptake

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the doctors and nursing staff at the family planning clinic, FMC, Owo for their immense support and also appreciate all our clients whose records were used for this research.

Disclosure statement

The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of this article.