Pregnancy issues – level of knowledge of pregnant women and educational role of midwifes

Abstract

Background. Every insured woman in Poland has the right to choose her midwife. There are not only medical actions in midwife’s duties during pregnancy care. She has a role of an educator, helps women in solving both: difficult and trivial problems, and is a mental support for them as well. A person which takes care of a pregnant woman has an obligation to send her to basic health care midwife between 21. and 26. pregnancy week. Educational meetings with midwife can take place once a week in a period from 21. to 31. pregnancy week and twice a week from 32. week, until delivery. Their purpose is to explain the physiology of pregnancy, to help dealing with pregnancy issues and to prepare woman to motherhood and delivery. Objectives. The purpose of this study is to determine, which pregnancy issues are most common, whether pregnant women have knowledge about them and what sources of information they use, and also to define an educational role of the midwife. Material and methods. There were polls made among women in the third semester of pregnancy at the hospital ward and health centres/gynecological and obstetric clinics. A hundred respondents took part in the survey. Results and conclusions. Most of pregnancy issues occur in the third trimester of pregnancy. The most common one during pregnancy is a frequent urination which is more frequent than before pregnancy, and the most onerous one – morning sickness and vomiting. Respondents’ age and educational level had a great influence over their knowledge. The majority of pregnant women chose a doctor and Internet as a source of knowledge about the physiology of pregnancy, and 74% of them would go to the midwife to broaden their knowledge on this subject. However, only 9% of the respondents took advantage of educational meetings with midwives, and 18% did not know about this possibility.