Womens Autonomy, Violence, and Maternal Health Care Utilization: Empirical Evidence From India

Equitable access to maternal health care services and reproductive rights ensures women's control over preferences and choices in helping to build their capacities to make decisions effectively. This study aims to explore the empirical relationship between intimate partner violence on maternal health care utilization among married women of reproductive age by analysing the moderating role of women's autonomy in India. We used NFHS-5 (2019-2021) with a sample size of currently married women, 51,392, from rural and urban areas. We first assessed the prevalence of maternal health care utilization by the Pearson's chi-square statistics between dependent and independent variables. Secondly, we estimated adjusted logistic regression models to examine the association between women's autonomy, intimate partner violence, and recommended ante-natal care (ANC) visits during pregnancy in India. This study finds that maternal health care utilization as measured by (a) recommended ANC visits and (b) institutional delivery is positively and statistically correlated with higher social groups (ie, general caste and other backward classes [OBC] in case of ANC visit and general caste for institutional delivery), residing in urban areas, hailing from a wealthy household, having fewer than two children, and both spouses were educated. All findings were reported for 95% CI and p-values.