Use and Attitude on Herbal Medicine in a Group of Pregnant Women in Tehran

Background: While the use of herbal medicines is common in Tehran, there is scant data regarding various aspects of the use of such medicines during pregnancy. Objective: The frequency of the use of herbal medicines in a group of pregnant women in Tehran and their attitude to the use of such medicines were evaluated. Methods: In this cross-sectional study, 600 pregnant women were studied. A researcher-made questionnaire was used to explore the demographic and pregnancy related data, the extent of use of the herbal medicines, the subjects' sources of information and their attitude regarding such medicines. The data were analyzed using student t- and chi-square tests. Logistic regression was used to determine the predicting factors. Results: 402 (67%) participants had used at least one type of herbal medicine during their current or previous pregnancies, with a mean of 2.71 ± 1.94 herbs per individual. Two commonly used herbs were peppermint (32.8%) and olibanum (26.3%). Maternal and Gestational age, family size, children number, frequency of having medical insurance and positive attitude in users were significantly higher than non-users (P values were 0.02, 0.02, 0.001, <0.001, 0.04 and <0.001 respectively). The score of attitude was the only predictor for taking herbal medicine with the odds ratio 0.89 (95% confidence interval: 0.86-0.92) of logistic regression model for negative attitude. Conclusions: Considering the high frequency of herbal medicine use during pregnancy, pregnant women need appropriate sources of information about these medicines. Further, health care providers should ask pregnant women about taking herbal medicines.