Antenatal Care Service

To promote the health and survival of mothers and babies,Kenya has adapted the WHO goal-oriented Antenatal Care (ANC) package,popularly known as Focused ANC (FANC). ANC visits are now used as an entry point for a range of other reproductive health services, thus promoting comprehensive integrated service delivery. This book provides a descriptive survey carried out in Central Division,Kitui District to establish the factors influencing utilization of antenatal Care services. Utilization of ANC services increased with the number of previous deliveries (X2=22.891, df=4, p=0.0001). Negative attitude towards health providers was found to hinder utilization of antenatal care services (X2=8.019, df=1, p=0.005). Consequently, women who had support from the spouse were more likely to utilize antenatal care services (X2=4.112, df=1, p=0.043). It is recommended that the Ministry of health and hospitals should improve training sessions for ANC staff regarding client handling in order to make the services more acceptable. Hospitals should utilize CBOs to sensitize the community about ANC services in order to encourage early visits among women in their first pregnancy as well as spouse support.