Development of guidelines to improve the uptake and quality of postnatal care in Ethiopia

Abstract

Post-natal care is a care given to the mother and the newborn during post-natal period. This period is crucial to save the lives of the mother and the newborn. Despite its importance, the utilisation of this service is very low in Ethiopia. This study was conducted to establish the views and experiences of women and health care workers on post-natal care services and determine the factors influencing its utilisation with the ultimate purpose of developing guidelines to improve uptake and quality of the services in South West Shoa Zone of Oromia Region, Ethiopia. The objectives of the study were to explore and describe the women’s views and experiences on utilisation of post-natal care service. Furthermore, the study sought to explore and describe health care workers views and experiences on provision of the services and to assess the factors facilitating or hindering to the utilisation of it. Ultimately, the study had intended to develop guidelines that would contribute towards improving the uptake and quality of the post-natal care services. The study used a qualitative descriptive and explorative research design to address the research questions. Qualitative data were collected from 19 women who gave birth in the past six months and from 24 health care workers providing post-natal care services (health care workers and health extension workers) and coordinating the overall maternal, neonatal and child health services in the study area (Zone and district health officials; primary health care units heads). The study used in-depth interview guides to collect data from the aforementioned study participants. Inductive thematic analysis was performed on the verbatim transcriptions using the Atlas ti version 8 qualitative data analysis software.