ABSTRACT
Introduction: today, population is the greatest problem in developing countries and family planning is accepted as a strategy against it by all countries and correct education of family planning and improvement of awareness level have a significant role in control of population in this field
Objective: present study was carried out to examine knowledge, attitude and performance of teachers in Rasht- City concerning Family Planning and Contraceptive Methods in 2001-2002
Materials and Methods: this study was performed in all teachers with different degrees. Sample size was 544 individuals and data were collected with questionnaires. In general, 503 questionnaires were analyzed by SPSS software
Results: age range of individuals studied was 25-55 years with mean age 38.4 years. Mean age of marriage was 24.1 with +/-3.7 standard deviation and mean number of children 1.94 with +/-0.9 year standard deviation. 57.5 percent of contributors have license degrees.44.1 percent of subjects regarded physicians and health care workers as the most important reference for achieving information. Mean score of awareness was 4.21 from a total score of 10 and 62.8 percent of them in terms of awareness were in intermediate degree. There was a reliable relationship between age and awareness [P Value 0.000]. Mean score of attitude was 3.73 in range of [-12,12] and 83.3 percent of persons were located in positive attitude group. It was found that there was reliable relationship between children number and attitude. [P.value:0. 005] Most common method for contraception was coitus interruptus [19.7 percent]. 42.7 percent of parents indicated that they had an unexpected childbirth
Conclusion: what was presented in this research revealed positive attitude among persons. In other words, there were strong motivations in the subjects concerning the necessity for family planning and prevention of unwanted pregnancies. However, due to low knowledge level about contraceptives, there was a high rate of unwanted pregnancies that suggest the poor performance of the investigatees