Living with infertility: experiences among Urban slum populations in Bangladesh.

This paper explores the perceived causes of infertility, treatment-seeking for infertility and the consequences of childlessness, particularly for women, among a predominantly Muslim population in urban slums of Dhaka in Bangladesh. In-depth interviews were conducted with 60 women and 60 men randomly selected from Urban Surveillance System clusters of the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh. Case studies of 20 self-perceived infertile women who had previously participated in a study on the prevalence of sexually transmitted diseases and other reproductive tract infections were taken, and three traditional healers were interviewed as key informants.