Awareness and Contraception Practices among Women—An Indian Rural Experience

Population explosion is a major burden on developing countries like us. Unregulated fertility not only disrupts the health of women and child but also disrupts the economy of society and nation. To gain the knowledge about awareness and contraceptive practices in women living in rural area a cross-sectional study was conducted over two years from 15/5/05 to 15/6/07 in relation to age, parity, literacy level, working place, source of knowledge about contraception, women practicing contraception and reasons for nonuse of contraceptives. It was observed that most of the women belong to the age group of 22 to 25 years 346.91%, 33.7% were para 2. 56.3% were working and 44%were literate and only 1 to 1.2% had education above high school level. Media including TV and radio was the main source of contraceptive knowledge, i.e. 70%. 67.5% of women were aware about temporary methods of contraception while 100% were aware about permanent methods of contraception, but number of women practicing contraception was very low, i.e. 35.7% and the main reason of nonpractice of contraception was family pressure mainly in laws, husband gender bias, physical abuse, etc. i. e. 59%. It was noted that though knowledge of at least one method of contraception was wide among the women but still actual practice was very low.