Uptake of Focused Antenatal Care Services Among Women of Reproductive Age in Nakuru County, Kenya

Abstract

The desire to correct the poor implementation of traditional antenatal care (ANC) in developing countries resulted to the adoption of antenatal care model termed as Focused Antenatal Care (FANC). The goal of FANC is to ensure a good outcome for both the baby and mother and prevent complication during pregnancy, labor, delivery and postpartum period. It is characterized by four main focused visits. Studies have shown that Kenya has long suffered from high maternal morbidity and mortality one of the strategies to reduce the high Maternal Mortality Rate (MMR) is effective implementation of FANC. The aim of this study was to identify uptake of FANC services among women of reproductive age with emphasis on their perceptions, cues to action and self-efficacy levels. The health belief model was adopted in the study to guide the researcher in understanding the respondents‘ behavior in seeking FANC services. The broad objective was to identify uptake of focused antenatal care services among women of reproductive age in Nakuru County. A cross sectional study was carried out. Data collection involved use of a pre-tested questionnaire for quantitative data and Focused Group Discussion (FGD) guide for qualitative data. The sample size was 337 participants who had delivered within two years. Data analyses was done using SPSS version 21 while chi square test was used to compare association between variables and content analysis for qualitative data. The study found that the demographic factors significantly associated with the uptake of FANC include age (p =0.0002), marital status (p =0.007), education (p =0.004), occupation (p =0.035) and the number of children alive (p <0.001). It was also established that achieving or not achieving FANC is significantly associated (p<0.05) with high, moderate or low levels of perceived susceptibility (p =0.015), perceived severity (p =0.03), perceived barriers (p <0.001), cues to action (p= 0.003) resulting from external influence, cues to action resulting from desire to have good pregnancy outcomes and levels of self-efficacy (p< 0.001). The study recommends that the Ministry of Health and other health sector should take cognizance of demographic characteristics associated with uptake of FANC. There is need for the Ministry of Health and other development partners to further strengthen the cues to action of women associated with the uptake of FANC services in Nakuru County. There is need to strengthen sensitization, information sharing and follow-up on FANC in a move to improve the uptake of FANC in Nakuru County