Assessment of Quality of Antenatal Counseling at a Tertiary Care Facility in Islamabad

Abstract

Background: Antenatal visit is a significant opportunity for health messages and preventive measures. Despite an active family planning program in Pakistan, the population control and contraception compliance is very poor. One key reason could be lack of health messages.

Objective: To assess the quality of antenatal counselling in a tertiary care health facility of Islamabad.

Methodology: A cross-sectional study was conducted in the MCH Center, Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences, Islamabad in a period of 3 months from December 2023 to February 2024. Study was approved by hospital ethics committee and a written informed consent was administered before a walkout interview. The study outcome was measured in terms of compliance with antenatal counseling especially messages for family planning and breastfeeding. Furthermore, the socio-demographic background was associated with the quality of counseling.

Results: The mean age of respondents was 28.7 ± 5.5 years and majority of them (90.0%) were in their 1^st and 2^nd trimester. Close to 60.0% of the respondents were unaware of contraceptive methods and breastfeeding messages. As most of the of the females 163 (78%) reported no breastfeeding counseling, they were the ones significantly non-satisfied with ANC too (p-value, <0.001).

Conclusion: This study witnessed a high degree of non-satisfaction from ANC among women.  Most of the ANC clinic visitors were not given basic messages of birth spacing and breastfeeding the newborns.