Identifying pregnancy-related risk perception among pregnant women attending antenatal clinic in Wolisso district of Oromiya Regional State

Abstract

Background: Maternal mortality remained persistently high in Ethiopia. Home delivery with unskilled birth attendant and delay in seeking care for complications are often reported to be among the main contributing factors. While ANC provides opportunity to empower pregnant women on pregnancy risk and benefits of skilled care, most ANC clients opt for home delivery. Objective: To identify pregnancy-related risk perception among pregnant women attending antenatal clinics in Wolisso district of Oromiya Regional State, Ethiopia. Methods: A cross-sectional facility-based study was conducted in February and March 2011. Results: Data were obtained from 434 pregnant mothers attending antenatal clinic with a response rate of 98%. Only 18% (95%CI= 14.4%, 21.6%) of them perceived pregnancy-related risk. Knowledge of 2 or more danger signs during pregnancy, delivery and postpartum were 27%, 6% and 14.5% respectively. In multivariate analysis, risk perception was higher among mothers who had >4 ANC visits (OR= 3.60, 95%CI= 1.20, 10.81) and complications during current pregnancy (OR= 9.90, 95%CI= 4.40, 22.22) while knowledge of 2 or more danger signs during pregnancy was higher among urban residents (OR=4.41, 95%CI=1.73, 11.19), mothers who had complication during current pregnancy (OR= 2.90, 95%CI= 1.30, 6.50), ANC clients who received information (OR= 4.76, 95%CI= 1.74, 13.08) and mothers who had two and three antenatal care visits (OR= 3.25, 95%CI= 1.34, 7.93; OR= 3.31, 95%CI= 1.29, 8.49) respectively. Conclusion and recommendations: The majority of pregnant women have high false sense of security against risk and lack of awareness about obstetric danger signs, which eventually result in delay in seeking care for pregnancy complications. This is likely to be true for seeking skilled attendant at birth. Therefore, IEC/BCC interventions should be strengthened, especially in rural areas. Besides, the result of the study depicted the clear benefit of optimal use of antenatal care, but it was found to be very low. Therefore, strategies to enhance optimal use of antenatal care should be identified, tested and scale up. .