Adolescent-parent communication on sexual and reproductive health issues and its factors among secondary and preparatory school students in Hadiya Zone, Southern Ethiopia: institution based cross sectional study

BACKGROUND: Adolescent communication with parents is paramount to reduce sexual health problems. Currently, there is a shortage of information on adolescent-parent communication in Ethiopia in general and study area in particular. Thus, this study is intended to determine adolescent-parent communication on sexual and reproductive health issues and its factors among secondary and preparatory school adolescents in Hadiya Zone, Ethiopia. METHODS: We used institution based cross-sectional study design. We stratified schools into urban and semi-urban settings. Then, a total of 8 schools were randomly selected from the strata. The sample size was allocated for each stratum. Finally, participants were randomly selected from separate sampling frames prepared for each stratum. We developed structured questionnaire from related literatures to collect data on adolescent-parent communication and its factors. We cleaned and entered data using EPI info version 3.5.3 and exported to SPSS version 20 for descriptive and logistic regression analysis. RESULTS: The proportion of adolescents who had communicated with their parents was 144 (35.0%). Multivariate logistic regression analysis indicates that participants’ knowledge about availability of adolescent and youth friendly sexual and reproductive health services at health facilities [AOR: 0.40, 95% CI: (0.26, 0.62),P-value = 0.001], utilization of adolescent and youth friendly sexual and reproductive health services [AOR: 0.46, 95% CI: (0.29, 0.72),P-value = 0.001] and respondents’ educational status: being grade 9, [AOR: 3.21, (95% CI: ((1.16, 8.89), P-value = 0.025] and grade 11; [AOR: 2.96, (95% CI: (1.06, 8.30),P- value =0.039] were statistically associated factors affecting adolescents for not communicating with parents on sexual and reproductive health issues. CONCLUSION: The findings of our study imply that adolescents were not communicating much with parents about sexual and reproductive health issues even though they were aware of adolescent and youth friendly sexual and reproductive health services. In addition, promotion of service availability may be important to motivate adolescents to communicate with parents. Contextual and age dependent communication barriers should be further identified. Further research is needed in the area to identify barriers particularly from parent side.