Explaining changing patterns and inequalities in maternal healthcare services utilization in India
Arvind Kumar Yadav, Pabitra Kumar Jena
Abstract
This study aims to examine the long‐term changing patterns of inequalities in maternal healthcare services utilization and to quantify the contribution of selected factors that explain the gap between poor and nonpoor women in the use of maternal healthcare services. This study used three rounds of the National Family Health Survey (NFHS) data conducted during 1998–1999, 2005–2006, and 2015–2016. Using Blinder–Oaxaca decomposition method (BODM), this study explores the inequalities in maternal healthcare services utilization between poor and nonpoor women and examines the relative contribution of each predictor. The findings show that the utilization of maternal healthcare services was low among poor women. Comparison of maternal healthcare services utilization results over the years reveals that inequality has been rising. The decomposition analysis shows that women's education, mass media exposure, partner's education, and women's age at birth of first child contributed an important share to the gap in maternal healthcare services utilization. The use of maternal healthcare services remains disproportionately low among poor women. Therefore, the Government of India should put extra effort to directly target these women for reducing the gap in the use of maternal healthcare services.