Conditional cash transfers for maternal health interventions: factors influencing uptake in North-Central Nigeria

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Baba-Ari, F, Eboreime, EA and Hossain, M ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1878-8145, 2018. Conditional cash transfers for maternal health interventions: factors influencing uptake in North-Central Nigeria. International Journal of Health Policy and Management, 7 (10), pp. 934-942. ISSN 2322-5939

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Official URL: https://doi.org/10.15171/IJHPM.2018.56

Abstract

Background: Nigeria accounts for a significant proportion of global maternal mortality figures with little progress made in curbing poor health indices. In a bid to reverse this trend, the Government of Nigeria initiated a conditional cash transfer (CCT) programme to encourage pregnant women utilize services at designated health facilities. This study aims to understand experiences of women who register for CCT services and explore reasons behind non-uptake of those women who do not register.

Methods: We conducted this study in a rural community in North Central Nigeria. Having identified programme beneficiaries by randomly sampling contact details obtained from the programme database, using snowball sampling method we sourced non-beneficiaries list based on recommendations from beneficiaries and other community members. Thereafter we undertook semi-structured interviews on both beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries and analysed data obtained thematically.

Results: Our findings revealed that, while beneficiaries of the programme were influenced by the cash transfers, cash may not be sufficient incentive for uptake by non-beneficiaries of CCT in Nigeria. Factors such as community and spousal influence, availability of free drugs, proximity to health facility are critical factors that affect uptake in our study context. On the other hand, poor programme administration, mistrust for government initiatives as well as poor quality of services could significantly constrain service utilization despite cash transfers.

Conclusion: Considering that a number of barriers to uptake of the CCT programme are similar to barriers to maternal health services, it is essential that maternal health services are available, accessible and of acceptable quality to target recipients for CCT programmes to reach their full implementation potential.

Item Type:	Journal article
Publication Title:	International Journal of Health Policy and Management
Creators:	Baba-Ari, F., Eboreime, E.A. and Hossain, M.
Publisher:	Kerman University of Medical Sciences
Date:	October 2018
Volume:	7
Number:	10
ISSN:	2322-5939
Identifiers:	Number Type 10.15171/IJHPM.2018.56 DOI 1622559 Other
Rights:	Reusing and publishing IJHPM published articles is permitted by following Creative Commons user license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. Users are free to copy and redistribute the IJHPM published articles in any medium or format under the Creative commons license terms and conditions.
Divisions:	Schools > School of Social Sciences
Record created by:	Laura Ward
Date Added:	28 Nov 2022 12:18
Last Modified:	28 Nov 2022 12:18
URI:	https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/47524