Parturients' need of continuous labor support in labor wards
Million Teshome; Ahmed Abdella; Solomon Kumbi
Ethiopian Journal of Health Development 21(1): 35-39
2007
ISSN/ISBN: 1021-6790 Document Number: 197940
Introduction: The presence of a companion during labour and delivery benefits for both the laboring women and neonate. Continuous labour support is practiced in different parts of the world. In Ethiopia, it is neither practiced well nor researched in-depth. Objective: The purpose of the study was to assess the attitude of women in response to labour support based at institutional deliveries. Methods: This is a cross-sectional study by design. Data on labour support was collected from 406 women who delivered at three University hospitals in Addis Ababa through trained nurses using a pre-tested questionnaire. The result was analysed using EPI INFO version 6 software packages. Results: Seventy-three percent of the study women had fear of labour mainly due to associated pain (66.1%). About 53% of them need to have a companion during labour. The reasons given for wanting companion were emotional (49.5%), information (25%) and physical (21.7%) supports. About 54% and 37% of women at labour need to have respectively their mothers and husbands as companions. The need for labour companion was significantly associated with maternal age (x2=13.57, p=0.00), educational status (x2=8.7, p=0.000), monthly household income (x2=14, p=0.00), marital status (x2=16.77, p=0.00), and mode of delivery (x2=9.69, p=0.02). Conclusion: There is a need of introducing labour companion system in our labour wards. Significant proportion of women preferred their mothers as companions. Further exploratory and operational researches suggested to be done in addressing providers, companion and programmatic issues to introduce policies and guidelines of labour support into labour wards.