Postnatal care service utilization and associated factors among women who gave birth in Debretabour town, North West Ethiopia: a community- based cross-sectional study.

BACKGROUND: World health organization stated that postnatal care is defined as a care given to the mother and her newborn baby immediately after the birth of the placenta and for the first six weeks of life. Majority of maternal and neonatal deaths occur during childbirth and the postpartum period. Scaling up of maternal and newborn health through proper postnatal care services is the best way of reducing maternal and neonatal mortality.

METHOD: A community based cross sectional study was conducted among 588 mothers who gave birth in the last one year from March 1-21; 2017. Systematic random sampling technique was used to select study participants. A pre-tested and structured questionnaire was used to collect the data. Data was entered in EPI info version 7 and analyzed using SPSS version 21. Logistic regression was applied to identify association between explanatory variables and the outcome variable. An adjusted odds ratio with 95% confidence interval and p-value less than 0.05 was computed to determine the level of significance.

RESULT: A total of 588 participants were included in the analysis which was the response rate of 100%. The prevalence of postnatal care service utilization in this study was 57.5%. Maternal educational status of secondary school and above (AOR = 3.29, 95%CI: 1.94-5.57), family monthly income of above 1500 ETB (AOR = 2.85, 95%CI: 1.21-6.68), alive birth outcome of last pregnancy (AOR = 5.70, 95%CI: 1.53-21.216), planned and supported last pregnancy (AOR = 3.94, 95%CI: 1.72-9.01) and institutional delivery of last pregnancy (AOR = 3.08, 95%CI: 1.24-7.68) were positively associated with PNC service utilization.

CONCLUSION: This study showed that the overall utilization of PNC service in Debretabour town is low. Mothers' education, monthly income, last pregnancy birth outcome, wantedness of the pregnancy and place of delivery were significantly associated with postnatal care service utilization. To enhance PNC service utilization and reduce maternal and neonatal mortality women should obtain appropriate education. Furthermore all pregnant women should give birth in the health facilities.