Maternal incentive scheme in Nepal – status of knowledge and financial benefits received by mothers on ANC incentive and safe delivery incentive program

Background: Antenatal (ANC) and Safe Delivery Incentive Program (SDIP) of Nepal is implemented with the view to increase institutional delivery, thereby improving maternal health. The program has been a public issue regarding its information cum. incentive received by the clients and reimbursement to the health facilities. The study aimed to identify and assess the knowledge with financial benefits received by mothers from 4ANC visits and institutional delivery. Methods: Descriptive study was conducted among six villages of Syangja district, Nepal in December 2013. Data was taken from mothers who had delivered during the last one year of study. Full concern was adapted to consent, anonymity, confidentiality and validity. Epi-data and SPSS were used for analysis and interpretation of data. Results: Among the total 414 mothers, 60.6% and 82.9% were aware on 4ANC incentive and SDIP respectively. Total, consulted, mothers who had delivered in health-facility (n=212) received delivery incentive. Comparing the delivery benefits with ANC (n=212), 65.4% of mothers were deprived from ANC incentive though they practiced scheduled ANC visit. As an interesting fact, some other cases of non-ANC visit (n=3) and less than four/non-scheduled visit (n=8) were benefited from the ANC incentive as opposed to the rule of scheme. Analysis has shown that mothers who were aware on ANC incentive scheme were 5.2 times more likely to receive incentive than those of unaware one. Conclusion: The utilization of ANC incentive is found to be the result of its level of awareness. Government and concerned authority should valuably focus on ANC incentive program to increase its utilization like SDIP.