Utilization of the Adolescent Friendly Health Services at the Ashaiman Polyclinic by In-School Adolescents in Ashaiman-Greater Accra Region of Ghana.

Abstract

The adolescence period is a crucial stage where young people are particularly vulnerable to health risks especially those related to sexuality and reproduction such as early pregnancy and child bearing, STIs including HIV, sexual violence. With the availability of adolescent friendly health services (AFHSs), it is expected that adolescents will go through this stage of development with minimal or no challenges at all. Adolescent’s health challenges are still on the increase and this may be attributed to so many factors including non-use of these adolescent friendly health services which are available to meet them in their own comfort for professional counselling and guidance through this stage. This non-use may also be due to so many factors which can be from the side of the service providers, knowledge on the services and service provisions (services provided and attitude of service providers) among others. This study explored the utilization of the adolescent friendly health services at the Ashaiman polyclinic by in-school adolescents residing in Ashaiman. That is, whether the in-school adolescents visit and use the adolescent friendly health services. The study was a descriptive cross-sectional design which employed quantitative data collection method. Adolescents between the ages of 10 and 19 years participated in the study. Self-administered structured questionnaire was used to collect data which were analysed with SPSS version 16.0. Pearson chi-square was used to test for statistical significance (p< 0.05 denoted statistical significance). Four hundred and six (406) in-school adolescents participated in the study. The ages of the adolescents were categorized into three groups: 10-13 (early adolescents), 14-16 (middle adolescents) and 17-19 (late adolescents). The distribution of age of the participants indicated that most of the students who were interviewed were the middle adolescents 191 (49.4%). They were predominantly females who constituted 62.2% of the total number. The results showed that in-school adolescents under-utilized the adolescent friendly health services at the Ashaiman polyclinic. In-school adolescents who utilized the services were 7.6% even though very few of them (5.5%) indicated that they have no need for any of the services. One hundred and twenty five (125) representing 36.9% had knowledge on the AFHSs which significantly affected utilization. Knowledge on AFHSs, sex, distance of facility and cost were found to be associated with utilization of the AFHSs. Ghana Health Service in collaboration with the Ghana Education Service and NGOs in the municipality should intensify education on the AFHSs in the schools, community and through community durbars and media. Keywords: in-school adolescents, adolescent friendly health services, Ashaiman polyclinic, utilization