Background: Adequate maternal nutrition is essential for maternal wellbeing, fetal development, and favourable pregnancy outcomes. Knowledge of recommended nutritional requirements is an important foundation for informed dietary decision-making, yet practical understanding may remain uneven among pregnant women and their partners. This study examined knowledge of recommended maternal nutritional needs among pregnant women and their intimate partners attending antenatal care in Abakaliki, Nigeria.

Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional survey was conducted at Azuiyiokwu Maternal and Child Health Centre, Abakaliki, Ebonyi State. A total of 171 respondents were recruited using systematic random sampling. Data were collected with an interviewer-administered questionnaire containing ten items assessing knowledge of maternal nutritional requirements. Responses were measured on a four-point Likert scale and analysed using frequencies, percentages, means, and standard deviations.

Results: Knowledge of maternal nutritional requirements was generally high, with mean scores ranging from 3.07 to 3.22 across the ten items. The highest mean score was recorded for awareness that pregnant women require more calories than non-pregnant women (M = 3.22, SD = 0.80), followed by awareness of the importance of nutrition during pregnancy (M = 3.21, SD = 0.87). Knowledge that nutritional requirements change during pregnancy was also relatively strong (M = 3.15, SD = 0.85). The lowest mean score concerned knowledge of the specific types of food recommended during pregnancy (M = 3.07, SD = 0.93), which also showed the greatest variability in responses. Knowledge of appropriate meal frequency was similarly less strong (M = 3.10, SD = 0.89). More than four-fifths of respondents reported receiving maternal nutrition information from health workers.

Conclusion: Respondents demonstrated strong general awareness of maternal nutritional requirements, but practical knowledge concerning specific food choices and meal frequency was comparatively weaker. Antenatal nutrition education should therefore move beyond broad dietary messages towards practical, food-specific guidance that supports informed nutritional decision-making during pregnancy.

Maternal nutrition, nutritional knowledge, pregnancy, antenatal care, intimate partners, Abakaliki, Nigeria

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