Knowledge and attitude of men towards participation in their wives’ perinatal care

Abstract

Objectives: Improving the maternal health requires an understanding of the men’s level of knowledge as well as the attitude about participation in their wives’ perinatal care in different societies. The present study aims to investigate men’s knowledge and attitude about participation in their nulliparous wives’ perinatal care. Materials and Methods: In this descriptive cross-sectional study, 300 husbands of nulliparous women completed the questionnaire of “men’s knowledge and attitude about participation in prenatal care”, in a referral perinatal care clinic in Hamadan, Iran, in 2015. Results: The level of knowledge about the wives’ perinatal care in more than half of the men (58 %) was poor and in nearly half of them (41.7%) was moderate. Based on different aspects of the perinatal care, the knowledge level of 59.7%, 69.7%, 52.3 %, 63.3%, 64.7%, 66.7%, 51.7%, 62%, 84%, and 78.7% of the men was poor in the physical changes, general health, nutrition, exercise, sexual health, risk signs, mental and psychological changes in pregnancy, delivery, puerperium, and neonatal care, respectively. None of the men had good knowledge about the aspects related to postpartum care (including puerperium and neonatal care). Further, the majority of men (65.3%) had a positive attitude towards participation in perinatal care. Conclusions: In the present study, the emphasis was put on the need for training the men interested in participating in various perinatal cares, especially physical changes during pregnancy, prenatal nutrition, risk signs during pregnancy, and maternal as well as neonatal postpartum cares.