Awareness and utilization of free maternal healthcare services among women in Mt. Elgon Sub-County, Kenya

ABSTRACT Maternal mortality remains a matter of public health concern with over 300,000 women dying while giving birth annually. This has driven policy makers to come up with free maternal healthcare services as policy intervention. The Kenyan Government adopted the free maternal healthcare policy in 2013. The policy exempts maternal services from user fees in all public health facilities. This is aimed at promoting skilled delivery to reduce pregnancy-related mortality. In Mt Elgon sub-county, only 45 percent of women deliver in a health facility, this is below the national average of 61.5 percent. This paper presents results from a cross-sectional study conducted in January 2021 in Mt Elgon Sub-County among 377 randomly selected women who delivered in the preceding 12 months and 4 FGDs with women of reproductive age. Descriptive statistics were undertaken while Chi-Square test was used for inferential statistics. Andersen behavioral model of health service use was used to examine how womens demographic characteristics and awareness regarding the free maternal health policy has affected utilization of maternal healthcare services. The results indicate that respondents were generally aware that there is a government policy on free maternal health policy. However, gaps still exist in terms of pushing awareness towards universal reach, infrastructure development, health worker patient ratio, timely provision of essential supplies and long distance to health facilities This calls for increased sensitization utilizing community health volunteers and allocation of financial and human resources allocation to the department of health within County Governments.