Background

Contraceptive use and fertility rates vary substantially among developing countries. An important factor, which affects the fertility of any population, is Contraceptive .Contraceptive use varies by age. Nepal over the past 15 years show an impressive increase in the use of modern contraceptive methods from 26 percent in 1996 to 43 percent in 2011.Objectives of the is to assess the knowledge, attitude regarding family planning and the practice of contraceptives among the married women of Dhabi VDC of Eastern Nepal. A descriptive cross-sectional observational study was done in Dhabi VDC .Total of 300 married women age 15-49 sample were taken from family planning center situated in Dhabi. Knowledge, attitude and practice on contraceptives were evaluated with the help of a predesigned questionnaire. Descriptive analysis was done by using SPSS 11.5software to obtain frequencies and percentages. Out of 300 interviewed women, the mean age was 27.94 years, 98% had heard about Family planning method. Radio was the main Source of family planning information. Regarding the usage of contraceptive methods, about 79.3% had ever used and 63.3 had current using some sort of contraception, among the method used Injectables were the commonly used methods About 71% of married women other child in the further. Despite the knowledge of all family planning methods majority of the women used Injectables. Easily accessible and easily to use were the main reasons for choosing Injectables methods.

Introduction: Gender equality has been a priority area of demographic research. One of the major reasons for high fertility and low acceptance of family planning is the prevalence of gender preference among couples. The objectives of this study were to identify the determinants and examine the extent of gender preference on fertility. Methods: This is a cross-sectional study carried from June 2008 to July 2009 in Duhavi VDC of Sunsari district of Nepal. Three hundred and fi ve randomly selected ever-married women of 15 - 49 years, who had at least one child were the subjects of the study. A questionnaire covering the areas on gender and fertility preference and methods and use of contraception was given and fi lled up. Results: The study showed that 42.6 % of the ever-married women belonged to the 25 - 29 years age group. Around 92 % of women whose last child was a male were using family planning methods whereas only 40 % of women whose last child was a female were using family planning methods. This difference was statistically signifi cant (P < 0.0001). Conclusions: The contraception use among the women having a female child was low, showing a desire for a male child which is one of the factors in the increase of family size in our society. Due to the patrilineal society, women are discouraged in the practice of contraception. Effective intervention programs need to be planned and conducted to rectify this situation.  Keywords: Determinants, Duhavi VDC, gender preference, impact, Nepal.

Tobacco smoking kills more than five million people a year worldwide. According to Nepal Adolescent and Young Adult (NAYA) Survey 2000, about one quarter of young boys and one in 10 girls have smoked tobacco at some time or the other. A cross sectional study was done in Jalthal & Maheshpur Village Development Committee of Jhapa district using simple random sampling method among 200 participants. Interview methods with semi-structured questionnaires were used as tool for data collection. The objective of this study was to identify the reason of initiation of smoking, explore the pattern of smoking and to assess the health knowledge among the smokers regarding effect of smoking. It was reported that, 63% of them started to smoke at the age of 10-19years.Most smokers were male, illiterate, unemployed and fell below the poverty line. Though most of the smokers knew the ill effect due to smoking; habituation was the main reason for not being able to stop smoking and 10% of them smoked for recreation.