Factors Associated with the Utilization of Postpartum Care Services in Nigeria

A cross-sectional study was done using the women’s data set from the 2008 Nigeria Demographic and Health Survey to determine factors associated with the utilization of postpartum care services among Nigerian women during their last childbirth in the five years preceding the survey. With postpartum care utilization at 44.9% and timely provision of care within 24 hours of childbirth at 33.3%, postpartum services remain a poor and neglected area of maternal health services in Nigeria. Age, marital status, parity, place of residence, region, level of education, wealth, religion and all three forms of media exposure were shown to be associated with utilization of postpartum care services. However after controlling for confounding factors all but daily radio listening and daily television watching were significant predictors. While not all categories of these individual characteristics turned out to be significant predictors, some of those that were significant had a positive influence on utilization of postpartum care services, while others had a negative influence. It is necessary to conduct further studies using these predictors to find out why and how they influence the health care seeking behaviors of women. The findings from this study should form the basis for interventions to increase the rate of utilization of postpartum care