Effects of Health Education on Knowledge of Safe Motherhood Services among Women of Reproductive Age in Rivers East Senatorial District, Rivers State

The knowledge of safe motherhood services helps to improve maternal well-being and healthy reproductive life, thereby reducing maternal mortality. This study investigated the effect of health education on the knowledge of safe motherhood services among women of childbearing age in Rivers East Senatorial district. Research question and hypothesis were formulated to guide this study. Quasi experimental design was implemented for this study. The population of the study area was 567,861 women within the age of 15-64 years. Sample size of 400 was obtained using Taro Yamane method which was selected through multi-stage sampling technique. The instrument for eliciting data for the study was titled ‘Knowledge and Utilization of Safe Motherhood Service Questionnaire’ (KAUSMOSQ) and an eligibility index of 0.86 was obtained using Kuder-Richardson. Data was analyzed using SPSS version 21.0. The results of this study illustrated that the health education had a significant effect on knowledge of safe motherhood service (eta= 0.43, p<0.05). The result of the study revealed that respondents in the intervention group had a mean score of 20.99±0.44 while respondents in the control group It was recommended that the Rivers State government in collaboration with the local government areas should provide functional health education units in the health facilities and at community levels to make health education on maternal health a continuous activity in order to enhance the knowledge of women of reproductive age as a strategy to reduce maternal deaths and healthcare professionals should incorporate health education in their effort to promote the utilization of maternal healthcare services thereby improving the overall health and wellbeing of women.