A. Olawole-Isaac

Spousal desertion and coping strategies among women with cervical cancer in Nigeria: a schematic framework for wellbeing

Background: Women that are not in good health cannot contribute to sustainable development but effective coping during and after sickness could enhance their contributions to development. Objective: The study examined the coping strategies among women with cervical cancer in different marital context in Nigeria Methods: In-depth interview from eight women survivors and patients of cervical cancer in two distinct marital contexts characterised by the presence or absence of husband from two states of Nigeria. Data were analysed using content analytic procedures and premised upon relationship-focused coping strategy theory. Results: The study identified basic coping strategies as seeking support from religious organisations and adjustment of sexual lifestyle. Conclusion: The study concluded that women’s coping strategies on cervical cancer varied according to marital context. The authors recommend counselling, increasing cervical cancer risk awareness and husband-wife support, especially during life-threatening sicknesses to engender quick recovery and improved well-being for sustaining women contributions to development.

Inter-spousal communication: A means for achieving concordant fertility goals

Background: Spousal communication strategy has gained attention as an effective means of reducing couple’s fertility preferences, its continuous measurement cannot be overemphasised in literature Objecive: This study examined concordance and discordance in the desired number of children among couples in Nigeria. Methods: The study used the 2013 Couple dataset of Nigeria Demographic and Health Survey. The method of data analyses involved univariate, chi-square and binary logistic regression. Results: The result showed that 34% of couples agreed on common fertility desires, while 66% disagreed. The logistic regression analysis using Likelihood Ratio test, showed that couples communication significantly explained the indirect effects of background variables on concordant fertility desire (P<0.001). Conclusion: We therefore, recommend that couples’ communication on family size preferences be encouraged by programs geared towards achieving SDG-3,5 aimed at improving women and child health and gender equality in decision making.

INTER-SPOUSAL COMMUNICATION AS A DETERMINANT OF CONTRACEPTIVE USE IN NIGERIA: A MIXED METHOD

The need for understanding the level of communication among couples is important in reproductive health. Agreement by couples on contraceptive adoption is a major consideration if population growth will be reduced. Therefore this paper tests the hypothesis that there is no significant relationship between interspousal communication and contraceptive use in Nigeria. The study employed both quantitative and qualitative method of data collection. The quantitative data employed the 2013 Nigeria Demographic and Health Survey Couple recode dataset, while the qualitative data was collected using Focus Group Discussion. Data was analyzed using Stata13 and the qualitative data was analyzed using NVivo 11 software. The result of the logistic regression model showed that there is a significant relationship between inter-spousal communication and contraceptive use (P<0.001). The result of the unadjusted model showed a Log-likelihood ratio [LLR] = 2335.0875, R2 = 27.05% and Chi-square= 1731.32 on 29 degree of freedom while, the adjusted model showed a [LLR] = 435.0011, R2 = 38.20%, Chi-square= 268.36 on 32 degrees of freedom, p<0.05. The reduction of 1296.3189 in the Log-likelihood ratio and an increase of 11.15 % in the R2 indicate a very good fit. In the qualitative study the findings showed that majority of the couples using contraceptives discussed with their spouses and more than half of them received their husband’s maximum support. We conclude that couples communication will improve the uptake of contraceptives and reduce the increasing population growth in Nigeria.