Assessment of Sexual and Reproductive Health Communication Practice and Associated Factors Among Female Undergraduate Students of Wolaita Sodo University, Southern Ethiopia
Creators: name: Tsegaye, Mulugeta
Publisher: name: National Academic Digital Repository of Ethiopia
Year: 2015

description: Introduction: Students of higher learning institutions are assets of the society and change agents in filling the gap in the past and on whom the future generation is based. Communication about sexuality and sexual matters is more important perhaps now than any other time. This is because youths are affected with the burden of unwanted pregnancy and its complication, HIV/AIDS, STI, and other sexual and reproductive ill-health to a greater extent. Objective: This study is aiming at assessing undergraduate female students ' communication on SRH issues with their partners and associated factors. Method: A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted among 815 wolaita sodo university undergraduate female students by using a structured self-administer questionnaire. Stratified cluster sampling was used. Simple random sampling was used to select the departments from each faculty in the university. Finally, the study subjects were selected using systematic random sampling technique. Result: The majority of the students 786 (96.4%) reported that it is important to discuss sexual and reproductive health with partner. However, only seven hundred seventeen (85 %) of the students had discussed with their partner on at least two topics of sexual and reproductive issues. In bivariate and multivariate logistic regression, age, academic year, knowledge on SRH issue and attitude on SRH issues were predictors of students' communication on SRH issues. Students with age group 20-24 were less likely to communicate on SRH issues than age group 25 and above (AOR=0.210, 95%CI: 0 .095 -0.463). There is also significant association between student's academic year and communication on SRH issues. Year five students were more likely to communicate than year one students (AOR= 9.03, 95% CI: 2.907-28.032) Communication on SRH issues was also significantly associated with having knowledge about SRH issues and attitude about those issues (AOR= 4.02, 95% CI: 2.519-6.410) and (AOR=7.851, 95% CI: 4.455-13.836) respectively. Conclusion and Recommendation In this study majority of the students reported that it is important to discuss sexual and reproductive health with partner. Although a small number of the participants reported to have iscussed SRH matters with their parent/s, much greater were preferred to discuss with their friends/peers than parents. This shows that Sexual and RH related issues continue to be socio cultural taboos among both young people and their parents. Therefore, strategies to enhance and Improve open communication on sexual and reproductive health between parents and students, as well as peer-to-peer education in schools, should be developed and strengthened as a means of increasing awareness about SRH issues. Key words  university female students  partner communication  parent communication  peer - peer communication  sexual and reproductive health  communication practice