CONTEXT: Women have a high unmet need for contraception in the year following a birth. It is important to examine whether providing family planning counseling as part of antenatal, intrapartum and postpartum maternal and infant health services is associated with postpartum contraceptive use. METHODS: Survey data from 2,733 women aged 15–49 from six cities in Uttar Pradesh, India, who had had a birth between 2011 and 2014 were used to examine associations between exposure to family planning information at maternal and infant health visits and contraceptive use in the postpartum period. Discrete-time event history multinomial logit models were used to examine any contraceptive use and method choice among modern method users in the 12 months following the last birth. RESULTS: Forty-six percent of women reported having used a modern contraceptive in the 12 months following their last birth during the study period; another 18% had used a traditional method. Among women who had delivered at a health facility, those who had received family planning counseling at that time were more likely than others to have used a modern method postpartum rather than no method or a traditional method (relative risk ratios, 2.0 and 2.3, respectively). Receiving a postpartum home visit by a community health worker that included family planning counseling was positively associated with modern method use rather than use of no method (1.3). CONCLUSION: Providing postpartum family planning counseling at the time of an institutional birth and during maternal health visits could increase women's uptake of a modern contraceptive method in urban Uttar Pradesh.
International Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health (formerly International Family Planning Perspectives) provides the latest peer-reviewed research on sexual and reproductive health in Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Asia. This quarterly focuses on contraception; fertility; sexual behavior; adolescent pregnancy; abortion; family planning policies and programs; sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV; and maternal and child health. Staff-written summaries of research published in journals in related fields help readers keep up with new developments in the field, while special reports and commentary and viewpoint pieces inspire new approaches to common problems. All research articles include abstracts in Spanish and French as well as English. Each year, articles chosen from the most recent volume for their special interest to readers in Latin America and francophone Africa are translated into the appropriate language and compiled into special issues, which are widely circulated in those regions.
The Guttmacher Institute advances sexual and reproductive health through an interrelated program of social science research, policy analysis and public education, designed to generate new ideas, encourage enlightened public debate, promote sound policy and program development, and, ultimately, inform individual decision-making.
This item is part of a JSTOR Collection.
For terms and use, please refer to our Terms and Conditions
Copyright © 2016 by the Guttmacher Institute. All rights reserved.
Request Permissions