Abstract
Background: In 2015, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) noted that countries will need to meet the increasing demand for contraceptives by the over 600 million 15- to 19-year-olds around the world. Although the unmet need for contraception for Women of Child Bearing Age (WCBA) in Nigeria is 12.7%, the value is higher (35.3%) among adolescents aged 15 – 19 years. Additionally, the unmet need for family planning (FP) among WCBA in Kaduna state is 5.8%, with 33.3% of women aged 20-24 years in Kaduna reported to have had a live birth before the age of 18 years. This study sought to evaluate adolescent contraceptive use in three referral health facilities of Kaduna metropolis. Methods: This is a descriptive cross-sectional desk review of 5543 FP clients that attended three referral centers between 2014 and 2016. Data on their age, parity and the use of contraceptives were collected from the clinic registers and analyzed using SPSS 22. Results: The FP client age ranged from 12 to 57 years, of which only 3.6% were adolescent. The annual proportion of adolescent contraceptive users ranged from 3.1 – 4.1%. More than 96% of the adolescents had given birth to at least one child. Around 62% of the adolescents used injectable contraceptives but there was no IUD use reported by any adolescent. Conclusions: The low proportion of adolescent contraceptive users and their limited choice of contraceptive methods, emanating from multiplicity of client and provider bias, calls for innovative interventions to meet the contraceptive needs of adolescents.
Highlights
Adolescents are defined as young people from the age of 10–19 years, which can be divided into early (10–14 years) and late (15–19 years)
This study aimed to evaluate the use of family planning (FP) services by adolescents in the referral health facilities of Kaduna metropolis
A total of 5750 registered all-female FP client were sampled for the three-year study period of which 5543 (96.4%) had complete client registration numbers
Summary
Adolescents are defined as young people from the age of 10–19 years, which can be divided into early (10–14 years) and late (15–19 years). The inability to meet this need will perpetuate negative health consequences of early, unprotected sex by adolescents such as unintended pregnancy, unsafe abortions, pregnancy-related mortality/morbidity and sexually transmitted infections (STIs) including Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV), as well as their social and economic costs[2]. This is further buttressed by the fact that annually, an average of three million unsafe abortions occur worldwide among female adolescents aged 15–19 years[3]. Conclusions: The low proportion of adolescent contraceptive users and their limited choice of contraceptive methods, emanating from multiplicity of client and provider bias, calls for innovative interventions to meet the contraceptive needs of adolescents
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