DETERMINENTS OF ANTENATAL HEALTH CARE UTILIZATION IN ETHIOPIA

Abstract

Antenatal Care can be defined as the care provided by skilled health-care professionals to pregnant women and adolescent girls in order to ensure the best health conditions for both mother and baby during pregnancy and it is one of the pillars of maternal health services.This study is an attempt to identify the determinant factor that affect Antenatal health care utilization in Ethiopia. In this study the data source was Ethiopian Demographic and Health Survey conducted in 2016(EDHS 2016) by the Central Statistical Agency (CSA) with a total of 4140 women of age 15-49 year groups. The data were analyzed by SPSS. The study used both descriptive and inferential statistics method of data analysis, which means from descriptive frequency table and from inferential statistics chi-square test of independency and binary logistic regression was used. The descriptive analysis of the study revealed that the coverage of Antenatal health care utilization from governmental health center/station was 60.6% in the country. From the chi square test of association variables like women education level, religion, women occupation, region, place of residence had significant association with Antenatal health care utilization. From the result of binary logistic regression region, residence, religion, women occupation and women education are significant predictors of Antenatal care utilization. Government should be creating awareness to improve women’s utilization of Antenatal health care service and reduce maternal mortality in the rural area and less user regions.