Beliefs on utilization of contraceptive methods among married teenage women in Pathein district, Ayeyarwady region, Myanmar

Abstract

This study focused on exploring the reasons for the different contraceptive methods among married teenage mothers in Pathein District, Ayeyarwady Region. The seven modern contraceptive users, five traditional contraceptive users and three non-contraceptive users participated in the study by doing in-depth one on one interviews. All the 15 informants were teenage married women who were living together with their husbands. The result shows that the main reason for using contraception was to prevent pregnancy. The other important reasons were too young to get pregnant , poor financial situations , pushed suggestions from parents , and low knowledge of parents in law regarding contraception . The teenage mothers have gaps in knowledge and information especially in sexual and reproductive health which impacts on their use of contraceptions. The different types of contraceptions that they use would be based on their belief especially in use of traditional ways. The reason from the informants who did not use contraceptions were afraid of side effects of modern contraceptions, belief that it was not effective to prevent pregnancy, belief in spirits that pregnancy is a gift of the life, forced by the mother-inlaw or husband to get the child and lack knowledge on contraceptions. Most of the informants were ashamed about discussing contraceptions, and reluctant to discuss such a topic with other people. Thus, this study suggests that sexual and reproductive health education would be needed especially for not only teenagers but also all generations to improve their knowledge. This study recommends conducting traditional method which is popular in the community instead of the modern contraceptive methods among the reproductive age group in rural Myanmar.