Knowledge, Practice, and Attitude of Married Women About Preconception Care

Background: Preconception care is an organized and comprehensive program of health care that identifies and reduces woman’s reproductive risks before conception through risk assessment, health promotion, and interventions. This study aimed to assess knowledge, practice, and attitude of married women about preconception care and find out the association between the level of knowledge and practice among them and some sociodemographic and obstetrical characteristics.  Methods: A descriptive study was conducted on 150 married women who had at least one pregnancy in Maternity Teaching Hospital in Hawler City and Taren primary health care center in Kasnazan from 26th November 2015 to 10th April 2016. The relevant data were collected through interview technique with study participants and filling out a questionnaire format, which contained five main parts: sociodemographic data, obstetric data, and knowledge, practice, and attitude of participants about preconception care. The obtained data were analyzed by using SPSS V. 22 through calculating frequencies and percentages and using Chi-square test. Results: After collection of data and analyzing the study results, it was revealed that the highest percentage (76.7%) of mothers had fair knowledge, 20% poor knowledge, and 3.3% good knowledge about preconception care. The majority of the study sample (68%) did not seek preconception care. Regarding attitude, 84.7% of the women had good attitude about preconception care. Conclusion: Kurdish women need to be educated about the preconception care and it is an important duty by reproductive health care providers. Midwives can play vital role for improving preconception care concept among women.