Sexual and reproductive health services to meet men’s needs

This paper attempts to understand the socio-demographic, economic and spatial factors associated with alcohol use before casual sex in Ghana. It draws on data from the 2008 Ghana Demographic and Health Survey (GDHS-08). The analysis in this paper is based 993 men who reported alcohol use before their last casual sexual intercourse prior to the survey. The initial analysis involved using proportions to describe the sample and background characteristics associated with alcohol use before casual sex. In order to examine the nature and strength of association between the explanatory variables and the outcome variable, it was necessary to control for the confounding effects of other correlates using multivariate analyses. Three Binary logistic regression models were used, since the dependent variable (alcohol use before casual sex) was constructed to be a binary outcome. These were run separately and the odds of alcohol use before casual sex are indicated in the form of percentages. Alcohol use before casual sex appeared to increase with age and at the same time occurred more among respondents older than 34 years. Alcohol use before casual sex was more common among participants who were employed (15%), as well as those in the poorest

Adolescent sexuality refers to sexual feelings, behaviour and development in adolescents and is a stage of human sexuality. Sexuality is often a vital phase of teenagers' lives. The sexual behaviour of youth is, in most cases, influenced by their culture's norms and morals, their sexual orientation. Research Objective of this study is; to study the associations between substance use and risky sexual behaviour among youth. To examining the diffentials in prevalence and determinants of risky sexual behaviour such as age at first sex, condom use, and non-consensual sexual experiences among youth. To study the linkages between risky sexual behaviour and their mental and sexual health problems among youth. The project Youth in India: Situation and Needs 2006–2007 is the first nationally representative study conducted to identify key transitions experienced by married and unmarried youth in India. A total of 174,037 households were enumerated and a total of 50,848 young people were successfully interviewed from these households (8,052 married young men, 11,522 unmarried young men, 13912 married women and 17,362 unmarried young women). Regression analysis revealed gender differences between risky sexual behaviour and their health. We also found that the linkages between economic activity, schooling status and risky sexual behaviour amo

A K Mathur*, RS Sharma and B K Singh
Background : RTI/STI are major public health concern amongst women especially in SEAR countries . Majority of women think menstrual problem and vaginal discharge as a part of their normal life and thus continue to suffer silently. Hence it is difficult to estimate the burden of RTI from clinic records and therefore data is extracted from ICMR community based study done in rural parts of the country. Multi level cluster sampling techniques was adopted and ever married women aged 15-45 years was taken as sampling unit.
Methods: Information with regards to characteristics of vaginal discharge, education level ,occupation etc was elicited from every sampled women .Also both the diagnosis made by ANM and medical doctor was recorded and compared.
Results : Out of 5567 of the sampled women ,16 per cent of the women were clinically diagnosed of RTIs that too belonging to low risk population and from villages. The results of logistic regression concluded that MTP, use of OC, high risk sexual behavior, and husband infected with urethral discharge may increase the probability of a women for contracting STIs.
Conclusion: The result demonstrating the association should not decrease the acceptance of IUD, OC but should be interpreted carefully.

Engaging men in family planning (FP) has been found to improve programmatic outcomes and increase gender equality. Little is known about the influence of couple communication on FP decision-making in India. We describe an intervention that utilized existing best practices for this purpose in Jharkhand, India. 572 men received 6, 90 minute sessions every 11 days for approximately 2 months. Sessions topics addressed: 1) gender equity, 2) communication skills, and 3) family planning knowledge. Post-intervention data collection is presently underway (October, 2012). At baseline 23% of the couples were using contraception and male condoms method most reported. We will test the relationship between changes in participants’ knowledge of FP, attitudes toward FP, GEM Scale scores, ease and frequency of communication and in increases in FP use. All statistically significant changes will be reported and complemented with qualitative data (focus group discussions & IDI) from participants and providers.

The research focused on establishing the obstacles to proper reproductive and maternal health in Uganda. Uganda. The study aimed at providing a clear basis for policy measures so as to reduce or curb down the high and rapidly growing child and maternal mortality rates in the country. The study used secondary data from the 2002 AYA baseline survey by Makerere University in collaboration with the Program for Appropriate a Technology for Health (PATH), Pathfinders International and UNFPA and the UDHS data sets, 2002 and 2006. The researcher used both univariate and bivariate analysis. In bivariate analysis Correlations and Chi square test was also used to measure the degree of association between the dependant variable and the independent variables.
The results show that 40% of the women don’t receive antenatal care from government hospitals and only 16% Receive antenatal care from these hospitals. Health care from government health care centers was not received by 28% and 29% of them did receive the services from these hospitals. 2% of the women were reported to having received antenatal care from Traditional birth attendants. Postpartum care is an important exercise a mother and child should go through after giving birth for proper and better health. Unfortunately 73.9% of the women in Uganda r

Legalized use of modern family planning methods is relatively new in Albania. Prior to the fall of communism, health services were prohibited to offer family planning.
Actually Family Planning (FP) is now a service offered all over the country in commune level with trained physicians and nurse-midwives to counsel for FP, provide contraceptives, and Logistic Management Information system.
Last ALRHS and ALDHS confirmed that Albanians achieved a TFR of 2.6, primarily through using withdrawal and relying on abortion as a backup method.
While a lot of investments are done from the supply side, the demand side seems to need more effort for increasing the contraceptive use. Albanian couples need to be provided with information on contraceptive methods. Based on the formative research results, an “ONC” was piloted it in two districts in Albania. The intent of ONC approach was to increase couple’s access to information about the benefits of FP and the modern methods available to help couples achieve their reproductive health goals.
After first negotiation counseling, a large proportion of couples changed their behavior yielding a rate of nearly 42.5 % new users from those visited second time concluding that: ONC should be conceptualized as an ongoing process.

Despite the concept of unmet need for contraception undergoing some considerable revision and refinement, research has continued emphasizing on women largely ignoring men. However, it is unacceptable to ignore men’s unmet need considering that reducing it translates into lowering fertility. Including men in family planning programmes and research cannot be overlooked if challenges related to reproductive health, unmet need inclusive, are to be effectively addressed. Using 2007 Zambia Demographic and Health Survey, we estimated the level of unmet need for currently married men and examined its determinants. Results indicate that unmet need for spacing, limiting and total was 28.0%, 19.5% and 47.5%, respectively. Men’s educational attainment and exposure to family planning messages in media were the most important determinants of unmet need for spacing, whereas number of living children and region of residence were the most important determinants of unmet need for limiting. Other factors associated with unmet need were age (35-49 and 50-59) and wealth (rich). Married men in Zambia have a high level of unmet need. Family planning services are not meeting men’s demand for family planning. Concerted efforts should be made for family planning programmes to specifically target men as contraceptive users.

In Argentina, RH programs focus mainly on family planning and offer their health services (HS) almost exclusively to women, but there is a growing perception that men’s needs have to be attended to, both for their sake and for the sake of women’s well being.
We present results from a household survey which was carried out among men 25-59 years old in the cities of Rosario and Reconquista, Santa Fe province, Argentina. Given the expectation that rates of use would be low men were asked about where would they seek attention in hypothetical situations of need and about the characteristics those HS should have.
In both cities the majority would resort exclusively to HS, except when seeking contraceptives or when having a sexual dysfunction. The young, the single and the childless would resort less to health services than older men. Interviewees preferred services located in the existing ones, with the majority having no preference for the gender of the provider, suggesting that efforts have to concentrate in strengthening the system rather than in creating new RHS for the male popul. However, other results show that populations from the same country and province may defer in some of their health seeking behaviors with signs of the existence of different ideological climates, showing that research has to be context specific.

This study investigated the role of men in some selected reproductive health issues, characterizing their involvement, including factors influencing their participation in reproductive healthcare. This study was conducted in the working areas of urban and rural implemented by NGOs. The study included 615 men. Bivariate analysis was performed between male’s involvements as the dependent variable with several independent variables. Logistic regression analysis was applied to assess the effects of risk factors on the participation of men in reproductive health. The mean age of the respondents was 34 years. The current contraceptive-use rate was 63% among the men who attended the evening clinics. Results of bivariate analysis showed a significant association with education, occupation, income, access to media, and number of living children. The logistic regression analysis showed secondary to higher education level, number of living children, paid employment status, long marital duration, and access to media were important correlates of males’ involvement in reproductive healthcare services. The results imply a greater integration of reproductive healthcare matters with the MDG and increasing perception of men through enrollment in various components of reproductive activities will produce synergistic effects.

Current U.S. public health policies recommend routine chlamydial screening among women but not men. While data are available on trends in diagnosed infections reported to local health departments, comparable data are not available on trends in undiagnosed infections prevalent in the population. We compare undiagnosed infections in Baltimore, MD using population surveys of probability samples of Baltimore adults aged 18 to 35 years conducted in 1997-1998 and 2006-2009. Annual surveillance counts of infections diagnosed and reported to the Baltimore City Health Department are tabulated by sex and race.

Among men undiagnosed chlamydial infection increased from 1.6% to 4.0% between 1997-98 and 2006-09 (p=0.05) whereas prevalence among women declined from 4.3% to 3.1% (p=0.41; p=0.028 for test of interaction). The annual (average) number of diagnosed infections was substantially higher among women than men in both time periods and increased among men (391 in 1997-98 and 878 in 2006-09) and women (3255 in 1998 and 4475 in 2006-09). In both survey periods, undiagnosed infection was substantially higher among black than non-black adults (4.0% vs 1.2%, p=0.042 in 1997-98 and 5.5% vs 0.7%, p<0.001 in 2006-09).

Divergent trends in chlamydial infection by sex parallel the divergence in current screening policies