Application of Andersen Model to Verify Utilization of Maternal and Child's Preventive Care Among South-East Asian Immigrant Women in Taiwan: Influence of Acculturation and Associated Factors

Kuo, Shu-Fen

Purpose:

This is a report of utilization of maternal and child’s preventive care based on Andersen health seeking behavior model. The purpose of this study was to examine the predisposing, enabling, need factors among immigrant women in Taiwan, and further to explore acculturation and other predictors of both utilizations.

Methods:

A cross-sectional survey was conducted. Immigrant women who were living in Taiwan with their Taiwanese husbands and with children under 7 years old were included. Andersen behavior model (1995) was used to identify influencing factors with acculturation and medical access barrier be added in the enabling factors, and health status in need factor. The Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) method was used by SPSS 17.0 and AMOS 18.0 for data analysis.

Results:

The completed sample included 284 women lived in 2 counties of Taiwan who were in 28.6 years old (SD=4.33) averaged. Results showed that the Chi-square test for the model produced a statistically significant finding (χ²=568.74, df =206, p=0.001; χ²=539.86, df =206, p=0.001) of maternal and child’s preventive care use. Based on the χ²/ df ratio (2.76; 2.62), the second-order factor baseline model fits the data quite well (CFI =0.826, RMSEA =0.079; CFI =0.837, RMSEA =0.076). There were four factors significantly predicted utilization of maternal preventive care: length of stay in Taiwan, educational level in original country, perceived support and integration. And three factors significantly predicted utilization of child’s preventive care: family income, perceived support and integration.

Conclusion:

Our findings indicated a significant relationship of predisposing and enabling factors with utilization of maternal and child’s preventive care. This study demonstrated that acculturation was a vivid factor to influence the utilization of maternal and child’s preventive care use. Clinical interventions based on these results should be developed and further to examine its effects in order to improve health behavior of immigrant women who might be in different acculturation and need more health support.