CONTEXT Women's behaviors before and during pregnancy can affect their infants' health. Particularly because many births in the United States are unintended, it is important to understand women's health behaviors and pregnancy planning status before they become pregnant. METHODS A telephone survey of nonpregnant women of childbearing age who belonged to a Southern California managed care plan...

Oral health is crucial to overall health. Because of normal physiologic changes, pregnancy is a time of particular vulnerability in terms of oral health. Pregnant women and their providers need more knowledge about the many changes that occur in the oral cavity during pregnancy. In this article we describe the importance of the recognition, prevention, and treatment of oral health problems in p...

While grief, emotional distress and other mental health conditions have been associated with pregnancy loss, less is known about the mental health impact of these events during subsequent pregnancies and births. This paper examined the impact of any type of pregnancy loss on mental health in a subsequent pregnancy and postpartum. Data were obtained from a sub-sample (N = 584) of the 1973-78 coh...

OBJECTIVE To examine the prospective association between symptoms commonly experienced during pregnancy and the mental and general health status of women 14 years post partum. METHODS Data used were from the Mater-University of Queensland Study of Pregnancy, a community-based prospective birth cohort study begun in Brisbane, Australia, in 1981. Logistic regression analyses were conducted. R...

Introduction. Unintended pregnancy is defined as a pregnancy which is a sum of mistimed pregnancy (pregnancy wanted at a later time) and unwanted pregnancy (pregnancy which is not wanted at all). Unintended pregnancy is a global public health problem and its sequels are major causes for maternal and neonatal morbidity and mortality with its effect to maternal metal illness as well. Objective. T...

background: pre-pregnancy care is considered as the services assessing and reducing the pregnancy risks through providing medical care and mental support. therefore, a pre-pregnancy counseling protocol was prepared based on a series of guidelines. this study aimed to determine the effect of the protocol on pregnancy and labor indices. methods: this was a four-phase field study conducted in four...

Access to reproductive health services for women with HIV is critical to ensuring their reproductive needs are addressed and their reproductive rights are protected. In addition, preventing unintended pregnancies in women with HIV is an essential component of a comprehensive prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT) programme. As a result, a call for stronger linkages between sexual an...