A knowledge, attitude and practices based study to know the awareness and acceptance of contraceptive methods in married couples coming to well-baby clinic of a tertiary care centre in Panvel, Maharashtra, India

Abstract

Background: Family planning plays a major role in improving the financial, nutritional, educational, social well-being of a family as a unit. To study the level of knowledge, attitude and practices of various family planning methods in eligible couples. Methods: Prospective Qualitative study was carried out from June 2021 - December 2022 on data of 180 eligible couples selected randomly from Well-Baby Clinic, collected through pretested and validated standardized questionnaire. Sample size was estimated scientifically. Results were arrived by descriptive statistical tests and correlational statistics using software’s like excel, SPSS. Results: The level of knowledge of contraceptive methods was 89.44% for OC pills, 67.08% depot medroxyprogesterone, 97.22% condoms, 84.03%, IUCD, 93.56% for female and 98.04% for male sterilization. Overall acceptance of any type of contraception was 55%, most commonly used method being condoms i.e.78.49%, OC pills 12.90%, IUCD 6.35%, depot 1.37% and 45% were using natural methods. Major factors affecting acceptance were desire to have more children, hesitancy to seek, lack of knowledge, decision making power of a woman in the family. Conclusions: Since our research finds contraceptive acceptance at 55% much lower than state average, we look into components of gender dynamics and offer array of choices to couples so that a well informed choice free of gender bias is taken. Continuity of personalized and dignified couple counseling from preconceptional, antenatal to postnatal period is emphasized to increase contraceptive acceptance. We recommend well baby clinics as effective point of delivery for family welfare activities using gender sensitive cafe-teria approach.