Knowledge and Attitude towards Safe Abortion among Undergraduate Students in Jana Bhawana Campus, Lalitpur, Nepal

Abstract

Background: Unsafe abortion is one of the health issue of the reproductive age women. In spite of abortion legalization, woman’s access to safe abortion is based on the knowledge related to safe abortion. Knowledge is essential part which equip women to get services and prevent from complications of unsafe abortion. Materials and methods: A descriptive cross sectional study was conducted with the objective to identify the knowledge and attitude on safe abortion among bachelor level student. Non probability total enumerative sampling technique was used to select the sample. Total of 310 respondents were included in the study. The structured pretested questionnaire was used to collect data. Pearson chi-square was used to find out the association between demographic variables and knowledge on safe abortion. Result: The result of the study showed that among the respondents majority 247(79.7%) were ≥20 years of age with mean age 21.4 years with SD 1.9. More than half 173(55.8) of respondents were female. Majority 193(62.3%) of the respondents had fair knowledge and nearly half of the respondents 154(49.7%) had positive attitude regarding safe abortion. Respondents’ knowledge on safe abortion were not significantly associated with their age, gender, marital status, ethnicity, type of family, area of residence and living arrangement. Conclusion: Despite having fair level of knowledge among majority of respondents, it is seen that half of the respondents had negative attitude towards safe abortion. This shows that there is a need for educational intervention among undergraduate students in order to change their attitude. Key words: Attitude, Knowledge, Safe Abortion, Undergraduate Students.

Knowledge, Attitude and Practice of Abortion in Slum Area of Kathmandu

“…The study result revealed that 60% of the respondents have positive attitude towards the abortion and its legalization. 11 The present study finding on attitude was less than the study conducted in Pokhara by Ojha at el 8 and Adhikari at el 10 where it was 94.3% and 90% respectively. This difference may be due to the difference in the age of the participant since these studies were conducted only in the students.…”