State of family planning

Knowledge, Attitude, and Practice of Family Planning Among Saudi Primary Health Care Attendees in Al-Ahsa, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

BACKGROUND

 Assessing community awareness and practice of the significance and methods of family planning is critical for improving the effectiveness and quality of services, policies, and planning, which has a positive impact on the health and quality of life of women, children, families, and communities.

OBJECTIVE

 This study aims to determine Saudi population's knowledge, attitude, and practice of family planning in Al-Ahsa, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

METHODOLOGY

 A cross-sectional study was conducted in Al-Ahsa, Saudi Arabia. The study included randomly selected participants (male and female Saudi primary health care attendees). All adult Saudi individuals of both genders attending primary health care centers were eligible for inclusion in this study. Data were analyzed using IBM SPSS Statistics for Windows, Version 15 (Released 2006; IBM Corp., Armonk, New York, United States). Descriptive statistics for the prevalence and quantitative variables was used.  Results: The study included 672 participants; 78.6% of them were females and 21.4% were males. 23.8% of participants aged between 20 and 30 years old. 73.8% of participants heard of family planning before. The source of information about family planning was reported as 36.9% from the Internet, 27.4% from relatives, 21.4% from the doctor, and 14.3% from books. 21.4% think that long-term contraceptive use led to permanent infertility. 81.0% of the participants said that they tend to use family planning methods. 78.6% of the participants have used a family planning method before, where 25.8% of the participants used natural contraception methods, 21.2% used surgical contraception, 27.3% used condoms, and 12.1% used hormonal tablets, while 13.6% used nothing. However, 65.2% currently use contraceptives. 31.8% use the natural method of family planning currently, 21.2% use surgical methods, and 6.1% use condoms.

CONCLUSION

 In comparison to many studies previously mentioned, the rate of family planning utilization was average, as was the level of knowledge and attitude toward family planning. However, there were some mistaken beliefs among participants regarding contraceptives. Age, gender, the duration of a marriage, education level, working status, and monthly income were all found to be significantly associated with knowledge of family planning.

The Effect of Religious Belief on the Attitudes of Pregnant's Toward the Fetal Health

The purpose of this study is to identify the effect of religious beliefs on the attitudes of pregnant women toward the health of the fetus. Pregnancy, one of the important periods of life, is a special period in terms of affecting both the mother's and the baby's health. Health beliefs and attitudes are the factors that have effects on mother-baby death rates (mortality)-which is one of the most important criteria showing health level of societies. However, the literature has limited number of studies on this issue. Volunteer participants who applied to the Gynecology and Obstetrics Polyclinic were administered a questionnaire in order to identify the frequency of performing worship practices. Women's beliefs about their roles in determining their fetus's health were measured using Fetal Health Locus of Control (FHLC) scale. FHCL scale is composed of 3 sub-scales which include Internality Locus of Control (FHLC-I), Chance Locus of Control (FHLC-C), and Powerful Others Locus of Control (FHLC-P). Non-normally distributed scale scores were analyzed with Mann-Whitney U test for two independent groups and Kruskal-Wallis test for three independent groups. The scores obtained from all the sub-scales of the FHLC scale according to the praying groups were statistically significant (p = 0.008, p < 0.001, p < 0.001, respectively). The sub-scale scores were not statistically significant according to the tendency of giving alms (p = 0.269, p = 0.695, p = 0.079, respectively). The FHLC-I and FHLC-P scores did not indicate differences according to the tendency of going to pilgrimage (p = 0.914, p = 0.578), but FHLC-C scores were significantly higher in those who tended to go to pilgrimage (p = 0.004). There was a significant relationship between the tendency of performing prayer and going to pilgrimage and attitudes toward performing double-triple tests and oral glucose tolerance test (p = 0.002, p = 0.035, respectively). Religious beliefs were influential on the attitudes of pregnant women toward the health of the fetal. Gynecologists should consider patients' religious belief sensitivity while recommending them screening tests or planning their medication.

Reproductive justice & preventable deaths: state funding, family planning, abortion, and infant mortality, US 1980-2010

INTRODUCTION

Little current research examines associations between infant mortality and US states' funding for family planning services and for abortion, despite growing efforts to restrict reproductive rights and services and documented associations between unintended pregnancy and infant mortality.

MATERIAL AND METHODS

We obtained publicly available data on state-only public funding for family planning and abortion services (years available: 1980, 1987, 1994, 2001, 2006, and 2010) and corresponding annual data on US county infant death rates. We modeled the funding as both fraction of state expenditures and per capita spending (per woman, age 15-44). State-level covariates comprised: Title X and Medicaid per capita funding, fertility rate, and percent of counties with no abortion services; county-level covariates were: median family income, and percent: black infants, adults without a high school education, urban, and female labor force participation. We used Possion log-linear models for: (1) repeat cross-sectional analyses, with random state and county effects; and (2) panel analysis, with fixed state effects.

RESULTS

Four findings were robust to analytic approach. First, since 2000, the rate ratio for infant death comparing states in the top funding quartile vs. no funding for abortion services ranged (in models including all covariates) between 0.94 to 0.98 (95% confidence intervals excluding 1, except for the 2001 cross-sectional analysis, whose upper bound equaled 1), yielding an average 15% reduction in risk (range: 8 to 22%). Second, a similar risk reduction for state per capita funding for family planning services occurred in 1994. Third, the excess risk associated with lower county income increased over time, and fourth, remained persistently high for counties with a high percent of black infants.

CONCLUSIONS

Insofar as reducing infant mortality is a government priority, our data underscore the need, despite heightened contention, for adequate public funding for abortion services and for redressing health inequities.