Emergency Contraceptive Use among Female Students at Nursing and Midwifery Training Colleges in Ghana: A Case Study at Dunkwa-On-Offin

Background: The purpose of the study was to assess the use of emergency contraceptives among female trainee nurses in Ghana using Nursing and Midwifery Training College, Dunkwa-On-Offin as a case study.

Methods: The study employed a case study design. A structured questionnaire was used, which took data on knowledge, perception and use of emergency contraceptives among female nursing students. Descriptive, bivariate, and logistic regression analysis techniques were used to analyze the data, and the level of significance was set at 0.05. Data were analysed with SPSS version 23.

Results: The results showed that majority of the respondents 215 (58.9%) were familiar with the purpose of family planning. Again, an overwhelming majority of the respondents (81.1%) said they had heard about emergency contraceptive and had their information from the health workers. It was agreed by the majority (55.9%) that emergency contraceptives were safe for users, hence positive perception about emergency contraceptive. The usage rate for emergency contraceptive use among the respondents was 63.0%. Age of the respondents was found to be statistically significant OR 0.21(CI; 0.43-1.12; p-value=0.000). Also, marital status and level/class were significant (p-value=0.001) and p-value=0.000 respectively.

Conclusion: The study concludes that if students are educated on when and how to use emergency contraceptive, the knowledge, perception and usage will help reduce unwanted pregnancies among female nursing students in Ghana. There is the need for service providers either at the facilities or pharmacies to provide adequate information about emergency contraceptive.