Assessment of modern contraceptive practice and associated factors among currently married women age 15-49 years in Farta District, South Gondar Zone, North west Ethiopia

Introduction: In Ethiopia contraceptive practice is one of the lowest when compared with many other countries. To prevent over growth of population, availability, usability of modern contraceptive method and identifying factors affecting practice of modern contraceptives should be given a priority. Due to this assessing modern contraceptive practice in the community will have a great input to program managers for decision making, appropriate planning, ongoing monitoring and evaluation as well as an accurate picture of health programmes. Objective: The objective of the study was to assess practice of modern contraceptives and associated factors among currently married women of age 15-49 years in Farta District, North west Ethiopia. Methods: A community based cross-sectional study was conducted from April 14 to 29, 2012. In this district multistage sampling technique was used to get a total of 748 women in one urban and eight rural kebeles. A pre tested structure Amharic questionnaire for the interview was used. Data collected from the field was entered into EPINFO 3.5.3 and analyzed using SPSS Version 16 statistical packages. Logistic regression analysis was carried out to see the effect of explanatory variables on the dependent variable. Results: The current modern contraceptive prevalence was found to be 66.2% and most respondents used inject able and Norplant. Among the variables respondent’s Knowledge (AOR =8.02: 95% CI=4.29, 14.98), approval (AOR=7.08:95% CI=4.00, 12.53), husband approval (AOR=15.59:95% CI=8.71, 27.89) and spousal communications (AOR=7.39:95% CI=3.89, 14.04).were positively significant with modern contraceptive practice. Conclusions: In this district current prevalence of modern contraceptive is low coverage. Husband-wife communication and involvement of husbands in decision making needs to be encouraged during family planning counseling sessions and community based family planning counseling service.