Abstract:
Background: In Ethiopia maternal mortality rate is very high more than one in five women die from pregnancy or
pregnancy related causes. The use of contraceptives to prevent unwanted pregnancies and unsafe abortion is an
important strategy to minimize maternal mortality rate. Among various forms of contraception, emergency
contraceptives are the only one that can be used after sexual intercourse offering chance to prevent unwanted
pregnancy. The aim of this study was to assess the knowledge, attitude and practice of emergency contraceptive
among women who seek abortion care at Jimma University specialized hospital (JUSH).
Methods: Institution base cross-sectional study on knowledge, attitude and practice of emergency contraceptive
was conducted at JUSH from April to June, 2011Data was collected using structured questionnaire and analyzed
using SPSS version 17.0.
Results: In this study 89 women were interviewed. More than half of them (48) were from urban area and 41 were
from rural area.46 (51.7%) of them were single. Of all the respondents only nine women had awareness about
emergency contraceptive. Seven of the women mentioned pills as emergency contraception and only two of
them mentioned both pills and injectable as emergency contraception. All of them have positive attitude towards
emergency contraception but none of them have ever used emergency contraceptives.
Conclusion and recommendation: The finding revealed pregnancy among women of 15-19 years was very
common. The knowledge and practice of emergency contraception is very low. But there is high positive attitude
towards emergency contraceptives. Since there is much deficit on knowledge of women on emergency
contraceptives, in addition to making them accessible; programs targeted at promotion and education of
emergency contraceptives is helpful to prevent unwanted pregnancy.
