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EXPLAINING THE GAP IN ANTENATAL CARE SERVICE UTILIZATION BETWEEN YOUNGER AND OLDER MOTHERS IN GHANA

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 July 2015

Sheila A. Boamah ,
Jonathan Amoyaw  and
Isaac Luginaah
Sheila A. Boamah*
Affiliation:
Arthur Labatt Family School of Nursing, Health Sciences Addition, University of Western Ontario, London, ON, Canada
Jonathan Amoyaw
Affiliation:
Department of Sociology, University of Western Ontario, London, ON, Canada
Isaac Luginaah
Affiliation:
Department of Geography, University of Western Ontario, London, ON, Canada
*
1Corresponding author. Email: sboamah@uwo.ca
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Summary

Over two-thirds of pregnant women (69%) have at least one antenatal care (ANC) coverage contact in sub-Saharan Africa. However, to achieve the full life-saving potential that ANC promises for women and babies, a nuanced understanding of age-specific gaps in utilization of ANC services is required. Using the 2008 Ghana Demographic and Health Survey of 1456 individuals, this study examined the disparities in the use of ANC services between younger and older mothers by applying four counterfactual decomposition techniques. The results show that cross-group differences in the explanatory variables largely account for the differentials in ANC service utilization between younger and older mothers. Birth order (parity) accounts for the largest share of the contribution to the overall explained gap in ANC utilization between the younger and older mothers, suggesting that ANC differentials between the two groups are probably due to biosocial factors. To a lesser extent, wealth status of the two groups also contributes to the overall explained gap in ANC service utilization. The policy implications of these findings are that in order to bridge the ANC service utilization gap between the two groups, policymakers must systematically address gaps in cross-group differences in the explanatory variables in order to increase the utilization of ANC to attain the minimum recommendation of four visits as per World Health Organization guidelines.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Biosocial Science , Volume 48 , Issue 3 , May 2016 , pp. 342 - 357
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press, 2015 

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