Perception and Acceptance of Pre-Marital Fertility Screening among Final Year Students of College of Health Sciences at a University in North Central, Nigeria

Premarital screening is a worldwide activity that aims to diagnose and treat unrecognized disorders and reduce the transmission of diseases to couples and children. This study was aimed at assessing the perception and acceptance of premarital fertility screening among final year students of the college of health sciences, University of Ilorin, Kwara state.

Farsi, et al. [5], found out that despite the relatively high level of knowledge, about one third of the participants were still reluctant to carry out premarital testing. Majority of students do not know that it is possible to determine their ovarian reserve, which is not surprising because ovarian reserve testing is not routinely offered in Germany [1] despite being one of the fertility screenings. Studies from the USA [7] and France [8] observed that more female students were interested in having access to screening technologies for ovarian reserve, which corresponds with the observation of [1]. Abubakar and Yusuf [9], in a study conducted in Usman Danfodiyo university teaching hospital, Sokoto, Nigeria, 198 infertile patients were evaluated. for men are also drawing attention. According to [10], young people in Egypt need more information on reproductive health and access to PMC services before they have their fi rst child.
Although their attitudes towards sexual matters are liberal, their knowledge about reproductive health and premarital care is still limited. "Infertility is a global health problem and a socially destabilizing condition for couples carrying several stigmas and a cause of premarital disharmony" [9]. "At least 30 million men worldwide are infertile with the highest rate in Africa and Eastern Europe" [11]. With the statistic above in which Nigeria is part of Africa, the issue of infertility cannot be overemphasized. Previous researches dwelt well of the knowledge and attitude of students which found out that there is still a reduced knowledge about premarital fertility testing [12]. This study therefore seek to assess the knowledge of premarital fertility screening, examine the perception and acceptability among the fi nal year medical students.
Therefore, there is a need to look into the perception and acceptance of fi nal year students as well as assessing their knowledge about premarital fertility screening.

Methods and materials
A cross-sectional descriptive survey, with a purposive nonprobability sampling technique was used. Population was 220 fi nal year students in college of medicine. Data was collected with a questionnaire instrument. The study was approved by the ethics and research committee of the institution and all other ethical principles and considerations were observed. The data analysis was assisted with Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 21 for windows using descriptive statistics; percentages and frequency distribution and inferential statistics of chi-square for correlation coeffi cient. Table 1 Table 3 shows that 75.8% of the respondents consented that undergoing pre-marital fertility screening is morally and religiously justifi able. In total, 66.8% believed that Pre-marital fertility screening should be encouraged among singles. More than half of the participants 67.9% agreed that pre-marital fertility screening should be done to know one's fertility status before marriage. Fifty-nine dot fi ve per cent (59.5%) of the respondents agreed that pre-marital fertility screening should be done by both males and females intending to conceive when married. More than half the number of respondents 60.5% agreed with the fact that knowing suitor(s) fertility status  The result in Table 5 shows the relationship between the respondents' perception and acceptance of pre-marital fertility testing. The result reveals no statistically signifi cant relationship between participant's perception and acceptance of pre-marital fertility testing (X 2 (1) = 0.39, pv = 0.53).

Discussion
The fi nding from the study revealed that the respondents had adequate knowledge of premarital fertility screening.
This was opposed to the previous study by [12]

Conclusion
We conclude that the respondents had adequate knowledge of premarital Fertility screening and reasonable acceptance of premarital Fertility screening. However, some of the respondents still have a negative perception of premarital Fertility screening. Therefore, students should be taught the implications of marriage without premarital Fertility screening.  If any disorder is diagnosed, I will want to get treated 180 94.7 10 5.3 It is advised that future surveys or studies should be conducted on the level of utilization of premarital fertility screenings in hospitals, as well as factors infl uencing premarital fertility screening patronage/utilization.

The implication of fi ndings to nursing practice
Although the awareness about the premarital fertility screening is quite satisfactory, its uptake is still very suboptimal, hence the need for health education for young people of marriageable age. Nurses could use these fi ndings to advocate for the clients and make policies as regards the cost and discomfort associated with some procedures based on the do no harm principles. The nurses should create an enabling environment where youths can easily trust them and get adequate information about premarital fertility screening.
Confi dentiality is a key issue when dealing with sensitive topics such as premarital fertility screening. The results, procedures and patient information should be handled with the highest level of confi dentiality.