Abstract:
Malaria, a mosquito-borne illnessis a major public health concern mostly to pregnant women in Tanzaniaparticularly in Kigoma District although the disease is preventable and treatable. Currently, WHO and National Malaria Control Programme recommend the Intermittent Prevention and Treatment of malaria by using scheduled SP doses for pregnant womenwhich is administered as DOT duringantenatal care (ANC) visit. The main objective of this study was to assess predictors of pregnant women’s uptake of IPTpSP provided at Antenatal clinics as Directly Observed Therapy in public health facilities in Kigoma District Tanzania. A cross sectional study design was adopted in which a mixed approach of qualitative and quantitative techniques was used. The sample size of the study was 369 respondents that comprised 367 conveniently selected women who delivered live births in 2016 and 2 medical doctors in charge from Maweni Referral Hospital and Ujiji Health Centre. Primary data were collected from respondents while secondary data were gathered from published and unpublished reports from public health facilities, library and internet. Survey and interview were used as methods of data collection whereas structured questionnaire and interview guides were instruments of data collection. Quantitative data wasanalysed through SPSS to reveal descriptive and inferential statistics.Content analysis was used for qualitative data. Logistic regression was used to examine predictors of IPTpSP2+ uptake. The findings show that there is low rate of IPTpSP2+ wherebyan average of 25% of pregnant women used at least 2 doses of SP in pregnancybetween 2014 and 2017. Social predictorsof uptake of IPTpSP2+ of malaria for pregnant women were motivation from colleagues (β4=1.693, p<0.001), education (β3=0.803, p=0.025) and spouses’ agreement (β5=1.242, p<0.001). Institutional predictors of were knowledge from training (β7=1.022, p<0.001) and first 3 months antenatal care (β10=0.764, p=0.014).
