Adekunle Ajasin University Researchers Have Provided New Data on Public Health (The impact of maternal health insurance coverage and adequate healthcare services utilisation on the risk of under-five mortality in Nigeria: a cross-sectional study): Health and Medicine – Public Health

2022 OCT 03 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- Data detailed on public health have been presented. According to news reporting originating from Adekunle Ajasin University by NewsRx correspondents, research stated, “Despite the progress in reducing under-five mortality (U-5 M) in recent years, these deaths remain considerably high in Nigeria. This could be attributed to poor health policies including inequality of health insurance coverage and access to adequate healthcare services utilisations which has remained inimical to achieving sustainable development goals (SDGs).”

The news reporters obtained a quote from the research from Adekunle Ajasin University: “Therefore, this study examined the impact of maternal health insurance coverage and adequate healthcare services utilisation on the risk of U-5 M in Nigeria. The data for the study were derived from the 2018 Nigeria Demographic and Health Survey and comprised a weighted sample of 127,545 birth histories of childbearing women. Descriptive and analytical analyses were carried out, including frequency tables and multivariate using Cox proportional regression. The results were presented as hazard ratios (HR) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs). Data were analyzed using Stata software version 15.1. The results showed that 14.3% of the sampled birth histories of the childbearing women were children who died before age 5. The results further showed that 97.7% of the children were of mothers who have health insurance and over one-half (56.5%) were children whose mothers had adequate healthcare services utilisation. The risk of under-five death was significantly lower among the children of mothers who were covered by health insurance (HR: 0.66, CI: 0.42-1.02) and those whose mothers utilised adequate healthcare services (HR: 0.78, CI: 0.68-0.90). A similar result was observed among children whose mothers reported that distance to the health facility was not a problem (HR: 0.81, CI: 0.72-0.86). Some mothers’ characteristics including educational attainment, wealth quintile and region of residence significantly influenced the risk of U-5 M.”

According to the news editors, the research concluded: “The study established that maternal health insurance coverage and adequate healthcare services utilisation were found to be protective factors against the risk of U-5 M. Also, the revealed low health insurance coverage of mothers calls for more pragmatic policy and intervention programmes through health insurance to achieve SDGs targets of ending preventable deaths of children under 5 years of age and ensuring quality, as well as universal access to maternal and child healthcare services.”

For more information on this research see: The impact of maternal health insurance coverage and adequate healthcare services utilisation on the risk of under-five mortality in Nigeria: a cross-sectional study. Archives of Public Health, 2022,80(1):1-12. (Archives of Public Health - http://archpublichealth.biomedcentral.com). The publisher for Archives of Public Health is BMC.

A free version of this journal article is available at https://doi.org/10.1186/s13690-022-00968-2.

Our news journalists report that more information may be obtained by contacting Chukwuechefulam Kingsley Imo, Department of Sociology, Adekunle Ajasin University. Additional authors for this research include Nicole De Wet-Billings, Uche Charlie Isiugo-Abanihe.

(Our reports deliver fact-based news of research and discoveries from around the world.)