Awareness and Attitude of Midwives and Midwifery Students toward Community Oriented Midwifery

As the literature indicates community-oriented midwifery can play an important role in woman health improvement. This study aimed at investigating midwives’ and midwifery student's awareness about and attitude toward community oriented midwifery in Shahroud University of Medical Sciences in 2009. In this cross sectional study, a self –made questionnaire including 20 items on awareness about and 25 items on attitude toward community oriented midwifery was used for data collection. The questionnaires were distributed among 102 midwifery students and midwives and 90 questionnaires were answered back. Awareness scores were categorized into three groups: low (less than 75), moderate (75-95) and high (more than 95) awareness scores, and attitude scores were categorized into three groups of negative (25-55), no idea (56-85) and positive (more than 85). The validity and reliability of the questionnaire were evaluated using expert opinion and test- retest respectively. Mean of attitude score was 95.8±10.4 and mean of awareness score was 89.8±12.1. There were no significant differences between midwives and midwifery students in their awareness and attitude (P>0.05). Awareness scores of midwifery student with continuous education were significantly higher than students that their education was non-continuous (P<0.05). Positive attitude towards community oriented among participants indicates the appropriacy of the background for any intervention to apply a community-oriented midwifery program. The moderate level of awareness scores in the sample population and their opinions about current educational programs imply the necessity of further specific education on community oriented midwifery.