relationship between women's satisfaction with prenatal care services and characteristics of the women and the provision of services

Women's satisfaction from prenatal care, can lead to increase using the services and ultimately improve pregnancy outcomes. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between women's satisfaction with prenatal care services and demographic characteristics of the pregnant women. This study used a descriptive correlational design. Data collection instrument was a questionnaire. The satisfaction dimensions were the accessibility, coordination, communication of the personnel, availability, and the received information regarding prenatal care, quality, and the cost of the services. The study subjects consisted of 530 Iranian women living in the west of Tehran, who gave birth and attended to the health clinics, at 6 week postnatal period. Most of the women [69.8%] had good level of satisfaction with provided prenatal care and 21.9% were satisfied at the level of excellence. The women were more satisfied with accessibility, received information, communication, quality of services. There was a statistically significant positive association between education levels, economical status, and health situation during pregnancy and women's satisfaction with prenatal care services [P < 0.05]. Women with high education levels, good economical status and optimum health situation during pregnancy were more satisfied. There were statistically significant association between the waiting time for prenatal care visits and the number of prenatal visits and women's satisfaction with prenatal care services [P < 0.05]. Women's satisfaction with the services were increased with the frequency of prenatal care visits, but their satisfaction were decreased as the waiting time was prolonged. According to the study findings, the majority of the subjects [90.7%] were satisfied with the received prenatal care. Therefore they could use health services continously and appropriately; so encouraging the other women to use the services frequently would be necessary

Investigating Effect of Premarital Health Counseling on Females' Awareness Towards Breast and Cervical Cancer

Premarital health counseling for couples, especially in females is very important in community's health. In the premarital counseling, females are educated regarding reproductive health, such as methods of prevention of breast and cervical cancer that helps to family health promotion. The aim of this study, was to determine the effect of premarital health counseling on the females' awareness This study was a quasi experimental design. The aim of the study was to determine the difference of the subjects awarness about methods of prevention of breast and cervical cancer at preintervention and post intervention. The mean and standard deviation of the achieved scores related to the awarenss were calculated. The sample size was 600 subjects who were attending in premarital health counseling program in selected health centers. The sampling method was consequence and the study tool was a questionnaire. The study finding, showed that the mean and standard deviation of samples age was 21.82 - 3.94 and 47.4%. The majority of the subjects had a level of diploma degree in education and, 76.6% were housewives. The differences between the mean of their scores of the subjects awarences in the two groups [who participated in the counseling and who did not] were significant [P < 0.0001]. Considering the importance of prevention methods of breast and cervical cancer, the researchers suggest to conduct a prospective study for assassing the effect of premarital health counseling program on females practice. The study findings showed, a high efficacy of the premarital counseling regarding the subjects awareance about prevention methods of breast and cervical cancer. Thus, the researchers recommend further studies of the efficiency of the premarital counseling on long-term outcomes among females, attending premarital counseling

Accuracy and precision of tympanic temperature in the reflection of core temperature

Monitoring of patients temperature is an important nursing clinical procedure. Body temperature is usually taken at different sites including pulmonary artery, rectal, oral, and axillary areas. Currently, infrared tympanic temperature measurement method is increasingly used as a convenient, noninvasive and rapid method. However, accuracy and precision of this method has been questioned. The aims of this study were [a] to determine accuracy and comparing tympanic temperature with rectal temperature as a gold standard and [b] to determire Precision [Repeatability] of tympanic temperature with single measurement. This was a descriptive-comparative study with the sample size of 336 subjects, executively selected from the patients who admitted to Rasool Akram Hospital in Tehran. The patients were 16-85 years old. The tympanic temperatures were measured using the Braun ThermoScan type 6020 and the rectal temperatures were measured using the type M9380226 that both thermometers had 0.1 °C internal error. The tympanic temperatures were measured twice per side with 1 minute of cooling off in each subject. Paired t-test showed that there was statistical difference between right and left tympanic temperature with rectal temperature [P0.0001], however, no differences between the second measurement of right tympanic temperature [P=0.172], twine measurements of left tympanic temperature [P=0.100] and also between right and left tympanic temperatures [P=0.500] were found. The Bland-Altman analysis showed that the mean rectal temperatures were 0.23°C more than the mean of tympanic temperatures, with ranges of agreement between 0.98°C to 0.51°C for right tympanic temperatures and the limits of agreement between -0.88°C to 0.41°C for left tympanic temperatures. Rectal temperatures showed that there was good correlation between right and left tympanic temperatures [r=0.78, P<0.0001 and r= 0.84, P<0.0001] respectively. Despite high correlation between the variables [rectal and tympanic temperature], there were clinically and statstically significant differences between them. Also the sensitivity of tympanic temperature was unacceptably low with the number of patients with fever. Therefore, it is concluded that tympanic temperature can't exactly reflect rectal temperature. Due to acceptable precision and ignorable bias, the tympanic method for temperature measurement can be used, though it is not perfect alternative for rectal route