"Adolescent Reproductive Health: Choice or Chance? "

Abstract

Reproductive health in general and adolescent reproductive health in particular has not received concerted attention in our country so far. The traditional view of marriage as "protection' to girls in puberty from premarital sexual exploitation thrusts them into conjugality even before physical maturity is attained. This paper presents hospital-based data of 51 married adolescent girls in their antenatal phase, consulting a local hospital in the city of Visakhapatnam. This qualitative study included take a personal data sheet and a semi structured interview schedule to assess sexual and reproductive health knowledge of the respondents. Findings from the study revealed that two-thirds of the adolescents were married before the legal age of marriage, one-fourth of the sample were undernourished and 98% were anaemic. Themes from content analysis revealed knowledge of sexual and reproductive health to be minimal. Contraceptive knowledge, HIV awareness, negotiating reproductive decision-making and fertility issues were found to be low.