Mothers’ healthcare autonomy, maternal-health utilization and healthcare for children under-3 years: Analysis of the Nigeria DHS data (2008–2018)

This study was designed to simultaneously examine if mothers’ personal healthcare autonomy within the household, and the level of their maternal-healthcare utilization, translates into better preventive (complete immunization) and curative (treatments for diarrhoea, fever and acute respiratory infection) efforts on morbidities in child healthcare. We analysed data pooled from three consecutive waves of the Nigeria Demographic and Health Survey: the surveys of 2008, 2013 and 2018. Using a multilevel logistic regression, we estimated the odds ratio for each of the outcome variables while adjusting for covariates. Findings revealed that mothers’ health autonomy is positively associated with child immunization and treatment of morbidities (except diarrhoea), a relationship moderated by the frequency of mothers’ exposure to media. Additionally, mothers’ healthcare utilization is positively associated with complete immunization, and all forms of morbidity treatment (except diarrhoea). Although the relationship between mothers’ healthcare-utilization and child immunization is not dependent on family wealth, however, the relationship between mothers’ healthcare utilization and treatment of morbidity is dependent. Policy effort should be geared towards stimulating mothers to seek appropriate and timely child healthcare and future studies could consider looking into the mediating role of paternal support in this relationship.