IJCM₁0A: Role of male spouse in antenatal care of pregnant women in the urban field practice area of Bangalore Medical College and Research Institute, Bengaluru – A Cross-Sectional study

Background: The husband has a great role to play in the antenatal care of his wife during pregnancy. Male spouse involvement is crucial and essential in utilization of the services and benefits, antenatal services to the maximum by the woman. The male spouse involvement will have positive impact on reproductive and child health. The extent of involvement of male spouse depends on the gender role attitudes and the social network. Objective: To assess the involvement of Male spouse in Antenatal care. Methodology: A community based cross-sectional study was conducted in the month of June to November 2023 among 263 Male partners of parous women between the reproductive age 15-45yr, in the urban slum area of BMCRI, Bangalore through simple random sampling technique. A pre-tested, semi-structured, questionnaire was used to collect the data, to assess their involvement during antenatal care. Data collected was entered in MS Excel and analysis was done using SPSS version 21.0. Results: In our study, 84% were actually present at the hospital during the delivery and 82.5% had good practice of taking appointment for ANC visits of their wives. About 77.6% were aware of pregnancy related danger signs. But only 35% participants accompanied their wives to ANC visit at least four times. Conclusion: There is a need to recognize importance and positive impact of male participation in antenatal care. Knowledge and attitude of men are the prime determinants of their level of participation in antenatal care.