Unintended pregnancies are common globally; an estimate is that about 44% of all pregnancies are not planned [1]. In a low-income country as Uganda an estimated 32% of all pregnancies are unintended, and among young women under the age of 20, more than 40% are unintended. Although the total fertility rate in Uganda has declined to 5.4 children per woman, teenage pregnancy and early motherhood is a major health concern. The median age at first birth is 19.4 years and 25% of women age 15–19 have begun childbearing [2].

Unintended pregnancies are leading to unplanned births, unsafe abortions and maternal mortality. Every year, almost 25 million unsafe abortions are performed worldwide and cause the highest maternal mortality in sub-Saharan Africa [3]. These unsafe abortions can be prevented through comprehensive sexuality education and prevention of unintended pregnancy through the use of effective contraception [4]. Increased efforts are needed, especially in low-income countries, to ensure access to contraception and safe abortions [3].

Family planning includes the capability to foresee one’s sexual and reproductive health and to allow spacing of pregnancies and delay pregnancies in young women at increased risk from early childbearing. Thus, family planning prevents unintended pregnancies and enables women who wish to limit the size of their families. By reducing rates of unintended pregnancies, family planning also reduces the need for unsafe abortion [5]. As women and couples wish to have smaller families and control the timing and spacing of births, investments in health-care programs are needed to address the growing request for family-planning [1].

There is a need of youth-friendly services that offer reliable reproductive health counseling and information as well as family planning methods to adolescents in Uganda. There is also a need of affordable and available family planning services that offer sufficient education to choose the best contraceptive method. [6]. Informed choice indicates that women are informed about the advantages with family planning methods and also what to do if they experience side effects, and about other methods to use. However, adolescents struggle when it comes to their right to be provided with the contraceptive of their choosing and need. Many providers showed negative attitudes to contraceptive use by unmarried and those without children, even though the national reproductive health policy had no such limitations [7].

The unmet need for family planning in Uganda, is 28% of married adolescents and even higher among unmarried adolescents, about 32% [2]. The Government of Uganda committed to increase age-appropriate information, access and use of family planning among young people (10–24 years) and to reduce the unmet need for family planning to 10% and increase the contraceptive use to 50% by 2020 [8]. However, the national guidelines for sexual and reproductive health and rights were not launched as planned [9]. Consequently, the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 3.7 by 2030; to ensure universal access to sexual and reproductive health-care services, including family planning, information and education, and the integration of reproductive health into national strategies and programs will be delayed [8], [10].

For reproductive health-care in a low-income country like Uganda, it is crucial to identify successful methods for reaching out and educating in order to avoid unintended pregnancies among adolescents. Thus, the objective of this study was to describe health care providers’ perceptions of family planning and contraception education for adolescents, in Kampala, Uganda.