The Knowledge and Usage of Contraceptive in the Central Region

Abstract

In Uganda contraceptive use is low, the high levels of unintended pregnancy and unplanned births in Uganda can be attributed primarily to nonuse of contraceptives by women who do not want a child soon. Married women’s use of modern contraceptives has increased significantly since 2000, nearly doubling (from 18% to 26%) between 2000 and 2011. However, modern contraceptive use remains too low to address the high rate of unintended pregnancy. During the same time period, contraceptive use among sexually active unmarried women did not change, 44% were using a modern contraceptive method in 2000, and the same proportion was doing so in 2011. Use of modern methods varies greatly according to women’s social and economic status. In 2011, only 13–16% of Uganda’s poorest and least educated married women used modern contraceptives, compared with 38–39% of the wealthiest and most educated women. A greater proportion of urban married women used modern contraceptives compared to their rural counterparts (39% vs. 23%). In 2011, the proportion of married women who had an unmet need for modern contraception— that is, they did not want a child soon or wanted to stop childbearing altogether, but were either not practicing contraception or were using a traditional method—was one in three, among the highest levels in Sub-Saharan Africa. Despite their higher levels of contraceptive use, sexually active unmarried women have even higher levels of unmet need for modern contraception (43%) than do married women (34%), which may reflect unmarried women’s stronger motivation to avoid pregnancy. Unmet need is higher among rural, less educated and poor women than among women who live in urban areas, have at least a secondary education or are better off economically, respectively. Their fore the objectives of this study aimed at finding the association between demographic, knowledge and awareness, socio-economic factors and teenage pregnancy which was included in the UDHS 2016. This study used secondary data and considered Central part of Uganda as the study population specifically teenagers who were currently pregnant and categorized into yes and no as the alternative. 1,539 teenagers from central Uganda (Kampala) were considered as the sample size for this study and this was determined by considering Population in Kampala. The factors influencing Knowledge and contraceptive use are multiple and at different levels of influence including the demographic, social and economic level and are; therefore a multipronged approach is needed to address this complexity