Male Participation in Reproductive Health

This study aimed to 1) present the profile of the respondents in terms of religion, ethnicity, year level, academic status, marital status, level of awareness, and sources of information on reproductive health programs; 2) find out the respondents’ extent of agreement to male participation in reproductive health, such as family planning, sexuality and sexual health, responsible parenthood, and prevention of reproductive tract infection and other reproductive related diseases. The study was conducted through the descriptive research design using qualitative research technique. According to Sanchez (2000), the descriptive research design analyzes present condition and the search for the truth concerning valuable to causeeffect relationships. The study was conducted at the College of Nursing of Liceo de Cagayan University. The respondents were composed of 60 male nursing students to select through the quota sampling technique with 15 respondents from levels 202-205. The criteria of selection were a) they are male nursing students; b) they must be equally distributed which comprised 15 male nursing students per year level; and c) they are willing to be included as respondents of the study. An interview schedule adopted from Green, et. al. (1995) and Casino, et. al. (2008) was used. The first part dealt with the profile of the respondents, namely: religion, ethnicity, year level, academic status, marital status, level of awareness and sources of information on reproductive health program. The second part was composed of items on the respondents’ extent of agreement to the male participation in reproductive health in terms of family planning, sexuality and sexual health, responsible parenthood, and prevention of RTI and other reproductive related diseases. The data were analyzed through the frequencies, percentages, ranked frequencies, and weighted mean. The male nursing students’ awareness on reproductive health programs is highly shown on the components of maternal and child health and nutrition, family planning, prevention of reproductive tract infections, men’s reproductive health, and prevention and treatment of infertility. The sources of information on the reproductive health programs are school lessons/from teachers, internet, family/relatives, classmates, radio commentaries, newspapers, religious organizations, and political officials. The respondents’ highest extent of agreement on male participation on reproductive health focuses on sexuality and sexual health, prevention of reproductive tract infection and other reproductive related diseases, and family planning. These imply that the respondents recognize that the goals of sexual health and prevention of reproductive related diseases can be achieved through a committed involvement of the male population. The implication of a significant agreement to family planning implies that the decisions on the best contraceptive choice for advantageous family limitation take both men and women as equally important. However, they showed a lowest agreement on male participation in responsible parenthood specifically on child rearing/feeding.

 

Keywords - Reproductive Health, Male Participation