Knowledge and Practices of contraceptives in married women population; A cross sectional survey from Lahore, Pakistan

Abstract

Background: About one third of all pregnancies are unplanned and 20% of all pregnancies end n abortion and to cope with this problem nearly all general practitioners provide contraceptive advice. Objectives: A cross sectional study was conducted in the OPD of Gynae and Obstreitics unit of Shama hospital, Government hospital Kot Khawaja Saeed, Ganga Ram , Rasheed latifand Farooq hospital from December 2017-March 2018 to determine the knowledge and practice of contraceptive utilization in married women of Lahore. Method: This study was carried out among 308 married women between the ages 17-50 years by administering a well-developed and validated questionnaire. Data was analyzed by using SPSS version 16. Results: Study results showed about 85% of participants have knowledge about contraceptives and 19.1% were aware about the ADR’S of contraceptives. The main source of information identified was health care providers (62.2%) and television (37.4%). The most commonly used contraceptives were oral contraceptive pills 36.1%, followed by condoms, injectable, IUD’s and barrier method. Known uses of contraceptives were 41.5% and the major reason for known use were prohibition by religion (23.8%) followed by lack of knowledge, economic problems and other reasons such as opposed by family members. Conclusion: The study shows low use of contraceptives despite high level of awareness. It highlights the need to motivate people for effective and appropriate use of contraceptives and to avoid the unwanted pregnancies and abortions.