Men's involvement in women's reproductive health: A community-based mixed-method study

Abstract

Female dominion in family planning has underestimated men's participation in female reproductive health. To assess male's involvement in female reproductive health with regard to safe motherhood and family planning and to explore the factors influencing the participation of males in reproductive and sexual health. A community-based, mixed-method study was conducted from May 2018 to January 2019 in urban Puducherry. All eligible couples with at least one child were included. Two-stage random sampling with a sample size of 373 was considered. Data were collected separately among spouses using epi-collect 5 and analyzed using the SPSS software version 23. Qualitative data were obtained using free-listing and pile-sorting techniques, analyzed in Anthropac software. 39.9% had planned their pregnancy. Only 33.5% of couples had decided together with the place of delivery. 76.7% of wives wish to involve their husbands in family planning. 88.2% of wives and 89.8% of husbands chose tubectomy as the preferred method of permanent contraception. Both husband and wife were involved in child rearing among 60.3% of participants. The changing dynamics of society, health-care provider initiative, and literacy level favored males' involvement in females' reproductive health. Men were involved in planning the pregnancy, supporting their spouse by accompanying for antenatal checkups, discussing with their partners about the complications faced during pregnancy. Health care facility-related factors and faith were perceived as hindering factors for males' involvement in reproductive health by either gender.