The Relationship between Maternal Health Literacy and Pregnancy Status in New Mothers who Referred to Health Centers of Yazd

Abstract

Introduction: Health literacy includes special knowledge and social skills in pregnant women to diagnose prenatal risk factors, healthy lifestyle, and proper nutrition during pregnancy. Health literacy affects the outcome of pregnancy by improving the quality of prenatal health care. The aim of this study was to investigate the health literacy in women referring to health centers in Yazd City of Iran in 2017.

Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted on 390 new mothers who referred to health centers of Yazd City selected by multistage cluster sampling. Data were collected by Maternal Health Literacy. Validity and reliability of the questionnaire were confirmed in previous studies. Data were analyzed by SPSS₂₁ software using T-test and ANOVA.

Results: The results showed that the mean score of health literacy was 54.67±9.85. The results also indicated that maternal health literacy had a significant relationship with educational level, knowledge of pre-pregnancy weight, and history of disease during pregnancy.

Discussion: The health literacy of new mothers was fairly favorable in this study. Health policymakers should simplify the required training for pregnant and lactating women to minimize the various factors that affect their health literacy.