“When you least expect, this happens, it’s already growing”: Problematizing the definition of unmet need for family planning

Background: Unmet need is an important indicator to understand baselines and set goals for family planning interventions. Women may not fall neatly in categories of met or unmet need for family planning as defined by the demographic and health surveys (DHS). We explore women’s experiences of unmet need for family planning and provide empirical examples of how the static, binary DHS definitions of met and unmet need for family planning may be problematic