PSYCHOSOCIAL HEALTH IN PREGNANT WOMEN AND ITS ASSOCIATION WITH FEAR OF CHILDBIRTH AND SPOUSE SUPPORT

This study aims to investigate the psychosocial health of pregnant woman and its association with fear of childbirth and spouse support. This descriptive and cross-sectional study was conducted with 250 women who applied to the Gynecology and Obstetrics Clinics of Sivas Numune Hospital between 12.03.2019 - 18.07.2019. Pregnant Introduction Form, Pregnancy Psychosocial Health Assessment Scale (PPHAS), Wijma Delivery Expectancy Questionnaire (W-DEQ) Version A and Spouse Support Scale (SSS) were used for data collection. For the comparison, regarding the data with normal distribution, t test for two groups and ANOVA for more than two groups were employed; regarding the data with non-normal distribution, Mann Whitney U test and Kruskal Wallis for more than two independent groups were used. A significant and negative correlation was determined between the psychosocial health of the participants and their fear of childbirth (p<0.001), and there was a significant and positive correlation between psychosocial health and spouse support (p<0.001). The fear of women regarding childbirth negatively affects psychosocial health status, while a high level of perceived spouse support positively affects psychosocial health in pregnancy.