A Qualitative Study Exploring How Family Planning Beliefs and Attitudes Contribute to Family Planning Behavior in Rural, Southeastern Kenya: Application of the Social Ecological Model.

Overall, about 20 percent or 8.9 million women in Kenya have unmet family planning needs. The total fertility rate as of 2014 was 3.9 births per woman, which did not meet the Kenya National Population Policy for Sustainable Development target rate of 2.5, a rate that was set to help improve the health of women and entire communities. Working with the staff from Nikumbuke-Health by Motorbike (N-HbM), focus groups and in-depth interviews were conducted in June of 2013 in four rural villages of Southeastern Kenya to elucidate the determinants of reproductive health, including the beliefs and attitudes surrounding family planning, and how these translate into behaviors. The study results indicate that there is high knowledge of contraceptive methods among the women in the communities, but this knowledge does not necessarily translate to behavior or contraceptive use. Application of the Social Ecological Model identifies mediators associated with family planning behavior and suggests areas for interventions to meet the communities' unmet family planning needs at the intrapersonal, interpersonal, community, and societal levels. This article outlines the specific recommendations given to N-HbM to translate family planning beliefs and attitudes into behaviors, as well as discusses the global importance of designing family planning programs that improve the health of women and their communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]