Sexual and reproductive health services awareness and utilisation among young people in a semi-Urban community in Cross River State, Nigeria

Abstract

Young people's unawareness and poor utilisation of sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) services is one of the contributing variables that increase the susceptibility of youths to many challenges in SRHR. This study sought to assess young people's level of awareness and utilisation of available sexual and reproductive health and rights services in Calabar South Local Government Area of Cross River State, Nigeria. The available SRHR services in the study area were identified. A community-based cross-sectional descriptive design was adopted for the study, whereby a sample of 325 youths aged 15-24 years were recruited from households within the 6 selected out of 12 political wards of Calabar Local Government Area, using a multistage sampling technique. A validated self-developed questionnaire was used for data collection which were analysed using SPSS version 22.0. Findings revealed low awareness (94.8%) of young people to available SRHR services, and the proportion of SRHR services utilisation by youths was also low (21.5%). There was a statistically significant influence of SRHR services awareness on youth's utilisation (P <0.05). Also, in the logistic regression, the P-value for all the variables showed that there is no significant influence of the predictor variables (age, religion, marital status, educational qualification, means of livelihood, mother's, and father's educational background) on the outcome variable (awareness and utilization). Limited awareness on SRHR services was a rationale for low utilisation of such services among young people. The study recommended training of health care providers on SRHR services with periodic monitoring to ensure that providers are maintaining standards of care. More community enlightenment through government-community partnership is required to strengthen the concept of SRHR, increase awareness for service utilisation and sustainable development.

Keywords: Service utilisation; Young people; awareness; sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) services.