Determinants of utilisation of antenatal care and skilled birth attendant at delivery in South West Shoa Zone, Ethiopia: A cross sectional study

Background: Ethiopia has high maternal mortality ratio and poor access to maternal health services. Attendance of at least four antenatal care (ANC) visits and delivery by a skilled birth attendant (SBA) are important in preventing maternal deaths. Understanding the reasons behind the poor use of these services is important in designing strategies to address the problem. This study aimed to determine the coverage of at least four ANC visits and delivery by a SBA and to identify determinants of utilisation of these services in three districts in South West Shoa Zone, Ethiopia. Methods: A cross-sectional survey of 500 women aged 15-49 years with a delivery in two years prior to the survey was conducted in Wolisso, Wonchi and Goro districts in February 2013. Data were collected using an interviewer administered questionnaire. Logistic regression models were used to explore determinants of ANC attendance and SBA at delivery. Results: Coverage of at least four ANC visits and SBA at delivery were 45.5 and 28.6 %, respectively. Most institutional deliveries (69 %) occurred at the single hospital that serves the study districts. Attendance of at least four ANC visits was positively associated with wealth status, knowledge of the recommended number of ANC visits, and attitude towards maternal health care, but was negatively associated with woman’s age. SBA at delivery was negatively associated with parity and time to the health facility, but was positively associated with urban residence, wealth, knowledge of the recommended number of ANC visits, perceived good quality of maternal health services, experience of a pregnancy/delivery related problem, involvement of the partner/family in decision making on delivery place, and birth preparedness. Conclusions: Raising awareness about the minimum recommended number of ANC visits, tackling geographical inaccessibility, improving the quality of care, encouraging pregnant women to have a birth and complication readiness plan and community mobilisation targeting women, husbands, and families for their involvement in maternal health care have the potential to increase use of maternal health services in this setting. Furthermore, supporting health centres to increase uptake of institutional delivery services may rapidly increase coverage of delivery by SBA and reduce inequity. This is a cross sectional survey of women of reproductive age (15–49 years) who had delivered in the two years prior to the survey. The study was conducted in Wolisso, Goro and Wonchi districts of South West Shoa Zone, Oromiya region in central Ethiopia. The three districts have a combined population of about 372,478 inhabitants and are served by one hospital which also acts as a zonal referral hospital, 16 health centres (HCs), and 89 health posts. In Ethiopia, maternity services are usually provided at HCs as well as at hospitals by a health professional. The sample size was estimated assuming institutional delivery coverage of 20 % based on the routine health data for the three districts, an absolute precision of 0.05, and a Z score value of 1.96 for 95 % confidence interval (CI). The sample size was further adjusted for a design effect of 2 yielding a minimum required sample size of 492. Multistage sampling using a modified Expanded Program for Immunisation’s random walk method [22] was used to select study subjects. The first stage involved selection of villages and the second stage involved selection of interviewees. First, the calculated sample size was allocated in proportion to the population in each district. Within each district, villages were randomly selected by probability proportionate to size. A total of twenty five villages were selected and 20 women were interviewed from each village. In each selected village, the centre was identified and while there, a pen was spun to identify the random walking direction. One team of data collectors began walking from the centre and visited consecutive households in the direction of the pen and another team went to the end of the village and visited consecutive houses towards the centre. One eligible woman was interviewed per household. Data were collected in February 2013 by trained data collectors utilising interviewer administered questionnaires that were adapted using the UNICEF’s Multiple Cluster Indicator Survey questionnaires and JHPIEGO’s tools for monitoring birth preparedness and complication readiness [23]. The questionnaires were pretested and translated into Oromo language. Two questionnaires were used: a household questionnaire which collected data on household characteristics, asset ownership and access to water and sanitation facilities; and a women’s questionnaire which collected data on characteristics of women and various aspects of maternal health care. Data were then entered in duplicate into EpiData version 3.1 and validated. The outcome variables were: (1) attendance of at least four ANC visits provided by a health professional or a health extension worker, and (2) delivery care by a SBA i.e. a doctor, nurse, midwife, or a health officer. Wealth index, which is a composite measure of a household’s cumulative living standard, was derived from factor analysis of household assets, housing material, and access to water and sanitation services [24, 25]. Attitude score was designed to assess attitude on three aspects of maternal health: birth preparedness, male involvement, and barriers to institutional delivery and it was derived from factor analysis of eight Likert-scale statements [23]. Barriers to institutional delivery focused on three aspects: costs, difficulties in getting to the health facility and handling of women by health facility staff. Male involvement focused on perception towards the husband accompanying his wife to the health facility for ANC and delivery, and the role of men in childbirth [23]. The scores were ranked into tertiles. Being well prepared for the birth of the baby was defined as having done any two of the following during pregnancy: identification of transport, saving money, identification of a blood donor, deciding on the facility where the baby will be born, and identification of a SBA [23]. Data were analysed in Stata version 12 using survey commands to account for the complex sampling scheme by specifying the stratifying, clustering and weighting variables. Specifying the cluster and strata using the svyset command followed by use of the svy prefix with estimation commands in Stata adjusts for standard errors and produces confidence intervals and p-values that are unbiased by the survey design [26]. Weighting was performed using the inverse of the probability of selection in each residence (urban/rural), to correct for a slight oversampling in urban areas. Characteristics of participants were summarised using percentages. Because the sample size had been calculated to estimate prevalence as opposed to two sample comparisons (i.e. attendance of four ANC visits and delivery by a SBA; both dichotomous), post-hoc calculations of the power of the study to detect significant differences between comparison groups at 5 % level were performed. The results showed that the power was above 83 % for almost all the key variables (see additional file 1). Logistic regression models were used to obtain unadjusted and adjusted odds ratios with 95 % CIs for the associations between various factors and each of the outcome variables. Variables with p < 0.1 in unadjusted analysis were included in multivariate analysis which was performed using the forwards fitting approach [27]. The significance of each variable in the model was assessed using adjusted Wald test to obtain an F statistic and its associated p value. All p < 0.05 (2-sided) values were considered statistically significant. The study protocol and tools were approved by the Oromiya Regional Institutional Review Board and by the district health management teams of the study districts. Due to low literacy levels in the study setting, participants provided verbal informed consent after they had been introduced to the purpose of the study and informed about their right to interrupt the interview at any time or decline to be interviewed without any future prejudice.