Knowledge and Practice of Family Planning by Women of Childbearing Age in Delta State, Nigeria

The problem of rising population, caused by high fertility rates, low death rates and aggravated by low contraceptive practice has taken a frightening dimension in most developing nations, including Nigeria, hence different authors have voiced their concerns and advocated ways out of the dilemma as a means of having a better society by the practice of contraception. This study investigates the knowledge and practice of family planning by women of child bearing age in Delta State with a view of knowing the current status of family planning and making relevant policy recommendations to the State. The study adopted a quantitative approach using a descriptive survey design in a cross sectional study using 582 structured questionnaires. The result of the research indicate that the women in this study showed good attitude to family planning and have very high knowledge of family methods (93.2%) which tilted towards condom (91.3%), pills (72.3%), and injectables (64.2%) with relatively low contraceptive prevalence (31.2%), thus indicating a wide gap between knowledge and current usage promoted by expectations of side effects of family planning methods. The conclusion of the study was that women should be educated on the benefits of family planning as well as on more family planning methods by using sources identified in this study as a way of improving population control and enhancing the standard of lives of the women in Delta State and Nigeria.