Factors Affecting Demand for Maternal Health Services: Antenatal Care Case Study in Assela Town
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Date
1998-06
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A.A.U
Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to identify and determine the effects of access variables, economic
variables, quality variables, and characteristics of households that affect demand for maternal
health services, particularly antenatal care services. In doing this the paper reviewed studies on
factors affecting demand for health services and models of demand for health care services used
by different scholars are also discussed.
The paper analyzed the determinant factors in two stages. In the first stage, logit model was
used to determine factors influencing the probability of attending or not attending antenatal
care. In the second stage, a reduced form demand model for health services formulated by
Behrman and Deolalikar (1991), and Pitt and Rosenzweig (1986) with some modification was
used to identify and determine factors governing demand for antenatal health care services in
Asella town using a cross sectional data of214 respondents.
The results obtained show that household income and education of mothers were the major
factors that influence probability of visiting antenatal clinic. The findings of the study also
indicated that gestation period of first antenatal visit, income of household, quality of antenatal
care services are among major factors that determine demand for antenatal care services. It
was observed that gestation period of first antenatal visit had a reducing effect on demand of
this care while income of household, quality of health education and health services increase the
use of antenatal care services.
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Keywords
Affecting Demand, Maternal Health Services