Ling-Hua Wang
Fooyin University, Taiwan
Title: The relationships of prenatal depression and health behaviors among pregnant women in Southern Taiwan
Biography
Biography: Ling-Hua Wang
Abstract
The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationships of prenatal depression and health behavior among pregnant women in the south of Taiwan. This study, a cross sectional study design, recruited convenience sampling 289 adult pregnant women, between 20 and 40 weeks gestational age from two prenatal clinics in Koahsiung city. Two main instruments were used in this study to test the model including the Health Practices Questionnaire-II and the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale. Results of this study supported a significant correlations found between these two main variables (prenatal depression level and health behavior) and prenatal and maternal variables. In general, pregnant women with higher levels of depression were less health behaviors during their pregnancy (r=-.355, p< .01). Pregnant women who reported higher level of depression were younger, less educated, and had lower income, and more children. Health behavior had a significant positive relationship with insured status (r=.129, p< .05), health status (r= .136, p<.05) and family income (r= .177, p< .01). Recognizing pregnant women with experiencing depression, clinical professionals encourage them to receive treatment. Prenatal nurses need to help pregnant women to deal with their depression, because decreasing their depression might improve their health behavior during pregnancy and would have positive birth outcome.