An Analysis of the Lifestyle of Married Women Admitted to Zahedan* Health Care Centers

摘要

Married women are one of the most vulnerable strata directly exposed to the impact of changes in various aspects of lifestyle. This study has been conducted with the objective to investigate the lifestyle of pregnant women admitted to health care centers. This descriptive cross-sectional study has been conducted on 500 pregnant women admitted to Zahedan health care centers from November 2014 to March 2015. For data collection, the researcher employed convenience sampling and a questionnaire with confirmed validity and reliability. The questionnaires were completed by the researcher through interview. Collected data were fed into the SPSS version 21(IBM Corp, USA)and then were analyzed using descriptive statistical tests (frequency). The mean age of women was 29.49±8.5. In terms of education, the majority of women had high school education (=33%). Collected data showed that 79.2% of the population under study consumed normal amounts of salt, 18.6% drank milk daily, 28.2% consumed vegetables daily, 14.8% used fruits daily, and 96% were non-smokers. The most popular form of exercise in the sample population consisted of hiking (=88.77%) and the majority of the participants (=59.18%) had less than three days of activity per week. In addition, 94.6% of the participants brushed their teeth one to three times a day and the majority of them (=43.8%) brushed once a day. The findings generally indicate the presence of inappropriate behavioral habits in women especially in the field of personal hygiene, reproductive health, and health control. This shows the importance of the role of health education in familiarizing women with appropriate lifestyles and correct behavioral habits as a preventive measure.