Introduction: Postpartum family planning (PPFP) is an essential service to prevent unwanted pregnancies, to keep birth spacing, thus preventing poor maternal, perinatal, and neonatal health outcomes in subsequent pregnancies. Objectives: To identify the reasons for not accepting PPFP and actual percentage of PPFP in the first 48 hours as well as the most preferred method of PPFP, most preferred interval contraceptive method in a tertiary care hospital. Methodology: The present study is a descriptive cross-sectional study, conducted in all four Obstetric units in De Soysa Hospital for Women, Colombo 08. Inclusion criteria - Postpartum Mothers (within the first 48 hours after delivery) the time from 25th of September 2019 until the sample size of 289 is reached. Results: 152 (51.5 %) of the participants accepted PPFP. Only 20 (13.3 %) accepted contraceptive methods during the first 48 hours of the postpartum period. Regarding not accepting the PPFP, 53 (37.8%) planned to use in the future (Interval methods), 31 (20.1 %) due to husband’s disapproval,20 (12.1%) due to fear of side effects and 18 (12.9%) wanted to have many children. The most popular PPFP method was Subdermal implant 82 (57.7 %), followed by PPIUD 48 (33.8%)) and PP- LRT 12 (8.5%) among participants. Conclusion: Approximately 50% of the study population accepted the PPFP and subdermal implant is the commonest mode of contraception. The commonest factor for denying contraception was the expectation ofusing the Interval contraceptive methods in the future.
