Seifadin Ahmed Shallo and Tesfaye Gobena
Background: Birth interval refers to the time duration between two consecutive live births. Children born soon after previous birth are at high risk for health problems and died at a younger age, especially if the interval between the births is less than two years. However, factors contributing to short birth intervals are not well addressed and few studies were conducted on this issue using maternal memory (recalling) to measure the duration between births. This may lead to over or underestimation of birth interval duration.
Methods: Community-based cross-sectional study design was used. We used Simple random sampling technique to select one urban and four rural kebeles (the smallest administrative unit in a given district in Ethiopia) and after the sample size was proportionally allocated to selected kebeles’, systematic random sampling method was used to select a total sample size of 660 women who gave at least two live births. Face to face interview was applied to collect data using pre-tested and structured questionnaire. Data were analyzed using SPSS statistical software version 20. Univariate, bivariate and multiple logistic regression analysis were done. With 95% CI, the P value of less than 0.05 was taken as the level of significance.
Results: In this study the median birth interval duration was 32 months, and being in age between 19-24 at last pregnancy (AOR=5.4, 95% CI (1.54, 8.9)), not using family planning (AOR=1.66, 95% CI (1.09, 2.77)), breastfeeding of index child for less than 24 months (AOR=9.6, 95% CI (8.93, 19.39)), and earlier history of short birth interval (AOR=2.5, 95% CI (1.48, 4.11)) were independent predictors of short birth interval.
Conclusion and recommendation: median birth interval duration is 32 months, which means one in every two inter-birth intervals among married women is less than the least recommended duration of birth intervals. The focus should be given not only to family planning service coverage, but also to awareness creation about optimal birth interval duration for reproductive age women.
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