Abstract

Background: Ethiopia has over 21 million young people and they account for approximately 22% of the total population. However, youth often lack basic reproductive health knowledge and access to affordable and confidential health services. This study assesses factors affecting adolescents and youths friendly reproductive health service utilization among high school students in Hadiya zone, Ethiopia.

Methods: Institution-based cross-sectional study design was employed to collect data from a total of eight secondary schools in Hadiya zone by using self-administered questionnaire from a sample of 702 students. Data was coded, cleaned and entered into Epi-info version 3.1 and analysed by using SPSS Version 20.0. Frequency, proportions and percentages was computed to describe the study variables. Binary and multivariate logistic regression analysis with a confidence level of 95% was computed to determine the relationship among variables with a significance level of less than 5%.

Results: The utilization level of adolescents and youth friendly reproductive health service was only 38.5%. Youths with a good knowledge of the type of adolescents and youth friendly reproductive health services were more likely to utilize the service than their counterparts [AOR=1.68 (95% C.I:1.06-2.65)] and those respondents who believed that youth friendly services can improve youth’s health were more likely to utilize the service than their counterparts [AOR=2.02 (95% C.I:1.16-3.52)].

Conclusions: The utilization level of adolescent and youth friendly reproductive health service was very low; and youths unaware of a type of AYFRH services, and those who don't believe that AYFRH services can improve youth’s health were less likely to utilize AYFRH services. Therefore, it needs a great effort and attention of all the concerned bodies to design and implement appropriate adolescents and youth reproductive health information, education and communication strategies in schools to influence the knowledge, attitudes and practice of youths to increase the service utilization.

Keywords: AYFRH service utilization; Adolescents; Youth