Determinants of Utilisation of Insecticide Treated Net Among Rural Households in Oyo State, Nigeria

Insecticide Treated Net (ITN) distribution is one of the Roll-Back Malaria interventions meant to prevent mosquito bite and reduce the incidence of malaria cases particularly among children and pregnant women. Despite high ITN ownership among rural households, many are still under the burden of malaria attack. The study therefore examined the determinants of utilisation of Insecticide Treated Net among rural households in Oyo State, Nigeria. The study used four-stage sampling procedure to select 195 respondents within households with at least one Insecticides Treated Net. Parameters assessed include respondents’ socioeconomic characteristics, level of knowledge on malaria and ITN, information seeking behaviour towards the use of ITN, constraints to ITN utilisation and level of utilisation of ITN. Data were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics at α 0.05. Respondents’ age was 43±10 years and 80.0% were married with household size of 6.0±1.0 persons. Close to half had secondary education (44.6%), more than half (50.8%) had low ITN knowledge and majority (70.8%) exhibited unfavourable information seeking behaviour towards the use of insecticide treated net. Frequent sweating, the feeling of choking and the smell of the nets were the main constraints limiting ITN utilisation. Utilisation of ITN was low (38.5%) among rural households. Respondents' sex (χ2=38.48), educational status (r = 0.141) and information seeking behaviour (r=0.309) were significantly related to utilisation of ITN. Also, sex (β=0.18), information seeking behaviour (β=0.228) and constraints (β=0.611) were the major predictors of ITN utilisation in the study area. The utilisation of ITN was low in the study area. Deliberate efforts by relevant stakeholders should be directed toward product design that will elicit positive information seeking behaviour and utilisation.