Knowledge and attitudes of Lebanese women of childbearing age towards emergency contraception

Abstract

Objectives: Unwanted pregnancy is sometimes associated with unsafe abortion, which may lead to maternal death. Pregnancy after unprotected sexual intercourse can be avoided by using emergency contraception (EC). Our study aimed to assess the knowledge and attitudes of reproductive-aged Lebanese women towards EC use.

Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted by interviewing randomly selected women aged between 15 and 49 years from the five major Lebanese governates. A pre-tested, pre-structured questionnaire was applied composed of three parts: (1) personal information, (2) knowledge about EC methods and (3) attitude towards EC.

Results: We found that 78% of participants had never heard of EC. Among those who had heard of EC, only 29.3% had good knowledge about it. Knowledge about EC was not, however, associated with participants’ sociodemographic characteristics (i.e., age, marital status, educational level and background, occupation and occupational field and area of residence). There was a positive attitude towards EC among 57.3% of participants. Attitudes were statistically associated with level of education, area of residence and whether the respondent had ever heard of EC.

Conclusion: Most Lebanese women of childbearing age lack knowledge about EC. There is a need to raise public awareness of EC.

摘要

目标：意外妊娠有时与不安全的流产有关, 这可能导致孕产妇死亡。通过用紧急避孕药（EC）, 可以避免无保护性交后妊娠。我们的研究旨在评估黎巴嫩育龄期妇女对用EC的认知和态度。方法：本研究通过采访来自黎巴嫩五个主要省份随机选择的15至49岁妇女, 进行了描述性横断面研究。本研究应用了预先测试的结构化问卷, 问卷由三个部分组成：（1）个人信息, （2）关于EC方法的认知以及（3）对EC的态度。结果：我们发现78％的参与者从未听说过EC。在那些听过的人中, 只有29.3％对EC有很好的了解。有关EC的知识与参与者的社会人口统计学特征（即年龄, 婚姻状况, 受教育程度以及背景, 职业和职业领域以及居住地区）并没有关联。57.3％的参与者对EC持积极态度。受访者的态度与相关教育水平, 居住地区以及是否听说过EC有关。结论：大多数黎巴嫩育龄妇女缺乏有关EC的知识。有必要提高公众对EC的认知。

Keywords:

• Attitude
• emergency contraception
• knowledge
• Lebanon

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank all members of the Faculty of Medicine at Beirut Arab University for their support.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest or biomedical financial interests.

Author contributions

RH, SS, DH, HM and AAEN contributed to the project design, data collection and entry, and writing of the manuscript. BA contributed to the study conception, study design, proposal development, oversight of data collection, data entry, data review, data analysis, data interpretation, writing and review of the manuscript drafts and revision and approval of the final version submitted for publication. All authors critically revised and edited the manuscript and approved the final draft.