Unmet Need for Family Planning among Teenage Women in Kenya

Abstract: Logistic regression analysis was applied on 2008/09 KDHS data in order to analyse the determinants of unmet need among teenage women in Kenya. Similar factors were found to affect both unmet need for spacing and total unmet need at bivariate level. Teens who had attained secondary or higher education, of medium and high wealth indices, and those who had an almost daily exposure to mass media were less likely to experience unmet need. Those who were ever married, aged at least 17 years and residents of Coast, Nyanza, Rift Valley and Western provinces were more likely to report unmet need for family planning. Multivariate analyses revealed that teenagers in the medium and high wealth indices households were less likely, while those aged 17 and 18 years, in the ever-married category, and whose exposure to mass media frequency is of a weekly basis were more likely, to experience unmet need for family planning.