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. 2017 Sep 11;17(1):300.
doi: 10.1186/s12884-017-1488-0.

Quality of antenatal care services and completion of four or more antenatal care visits in Ethiopia: a finding based on a demographic and health survey

Kindie Fentahun Muchie  1
Affiliations

Quality of antenatal care services and completion of four or more antenatal care visits in Ethiopia: a finding based on a demographic and health survey

Kindie Fentahun Muchie. BMC Pregnancy Childbirth. .

Abstract

Background: Antenatal care (ANC) is one of the core interventions for improving maternal outcomes. The average annual decline of maternal mortality rate from 1990 to 2013 was 5% in Ethiopia. This figure was below the least expected 5.5% to achieve the targeted 75% by 1990-2015. Moreover, completion of the recommended four or more ANC visits was only 32%. This study was aimed to examine individual, household and community level potential determinants of completing the recommended visits in the country.

Methods: The 2014 Ethiopian Mini Demographic and Health Survey data were used. Among women aged 15-49 years 3694 who had given birth in the 5 years preceding the survey were included in the analysis. The robust standard error method of generalized estimation equations were used for binary outcome variable from the clustered data.

Results: Only 33.0% (95% CI 31. 5% 34.5%) of women completed the recommended visits. Out of the total women, 56.5% had at least one ANC visit. Out of those who had at least one ANC visit, 37.4% visited in their first trimester. Completing the recommended visits was negatively associated with women in the lower educational level, lower economic conditions, higher birth order, and rural residence. But, it was positively associated with the community level high quality ANC services received. Difference in age and region also affected the completion of the recommended visits.

Conclusion: The finding revealed the need for improving the uptake of ANC services, early arrival in the first trimester for services, and motivating mothers that begin ANC to confirm continuity. Strategies to foster completing the recommended visits should focus on upgrading quality of care services at the community level. Women in low economic level, high birth order, rural residence, and low educational status should be given special attention. Early and late age groups should be given special attention regarding the services.

Keywords: ANC; Clustered data; Determinants; Ethiopia; Four or more visits.

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Conflict of interest statement

Ethics approval and consent to participate

The ethics committee of the Ministry of Health, Government of Ethiopia, reviewed and approved the survey. All respondents to the survey provided verbal informed consent. The 2014 EMDHS dataset is not available as a public domain. The author requested the Director of Central Statistics Agency of Ethiopia and access was granted to use the data.

Consent for publication

The manuscript does not contain any individual person’s data.

Competing interests

The author declares that he/she has no competing interests.

Publisher’s Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

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