Empowerment and use of antenatal care among women in Ghana: a cross-sectional study

Abstract

BackgroundEmpowerment among women in the context of a romantic relationship may affect the use of reproductive healthcare services; however, current literature examining this association is limited and inconsistent. We therefore aimed to examine the relationship between several measures of empowerment and use of inadequate antenatal care among women in Ghana.MethodsWe conducted a cross-sectional study using data from a nationally representative cohort of women in Ghana. Our analytic sample was limited to non-pregnant women who had been pregnant and involved in a relationship within the last 12 months. We used multivariable logistic regression to assess the associations between empowerment and inadequate use of antenatal care and interaction terms to assess moderation by education.ResultsApproximately 26% of women received inadequate antenatal care. Multivariable analysis indicated that having experienced physical abuse in the past year was directly associated with inadequate use of antenatal care (OR = 5.12; 95% CI = 1.35, 19.43) after adjusting for socio-demographic characteristics. This effect was particularly pronounced among women with no formal education and was non-significant among women with at least some formal education (P-value for interaction <0.001).ConclusionsResults suggest that improving use of reproductive health care services will require reducing partner abuse and enhancing empowerment among women in Ghana and other low-income countries, particularly among those with no formal education. Furthermore, the involvement of male partners will be critical for improving reproductive health outcomes, and increasing education among girls in these settings is likely a strong approach for improving reproductive health and buffering effects of low empowerment among women.

Quality of Antenatal Care Offered at Nambale Sub County, Busia County

“…This was evident from the low number of pregnant women in the sub-county who had undergone the basic tests required (Hemoglobin test, syphilis test, HIV test, malaria test and urine analysis) (19.5 %) and non-adherence to prescribed standards of care as seen in the high number of missed opportunities. This was similar to a study in Ethiopia [11] where lack of reagents to perform VDRL test (Syphilis test), blood group and Rhesus factor test partly explained the problems observed in the provision of recommended care components. Shortage of equipment and supplies and inadequate capacity to deal with a large number of pregnant women was also noted in another study in Malawi [12] .…”

Women autonomy and maternal healthcare services utilization among young ever-married women in Nigeria

“…Education was also found to be significantly associated with the use of maternal healthcare services and this is consistent with the findings of Furuta and Salway (2006), Sipsma et al (2014), Adeoye (2015), Bhandari et al (2017), Fawole and Tiruneh et al (2017), Duah and Adisah-Atta (2017). This finding can be explained by the Awoleye et al 71 fact that better educated women have access to more information either through the mass media or social media compared to less educated women.…”

Development and validation of a new tool to measure Iranian pregnant women's empowerment

“…However, before this study, there was no specific scale that measured all aspects of empowerment in the specific cultural context of Iranian women. Also, during the literature review, it was noticed that different tools (8)(9)(10)14) only focussed on certain dimensions of empowerment and there was no tool that evaluated all dimensions of women's empowerment cumulatively. The SSPEQ developed in this study measures the 3 main dimensions of empowerment: sociopolitical, autonomy and educational.…”

“…The common dimensions of women's empowerment which have been evaluated include financial, social, cultural, legal, political, psychological and family, which cover some of the key terms used to define empowerment such as option, control, power and choice (5)(6)(7). Some researchers have measured empowerment with tools based on a small number of questions which evaluate only one or two aspects of empowerment (8)(9)(10). Meanwhile, different dimensions of empowerment may be conceptualized differently depending on the context (4,5).…”