Health Belief Model in Iodine Defficiency Prevention of Pregnancues in Nayung District, Udon Thani Province

Abstract

         The purposes of this cross-sectional descriptive research were to study the levels of behavior and health belief model in iodine deficiency prevention of pregnant women and also to test the relationship between the health belief model factors and prevention behavior of iodine deficiency in pregnant women in Nayung district, Udon Thani province. The data were collected from the sample group consisting of 98 pregnant women who had the services at the health-promoting hospitals and primary care units in Nayung hospital for antenatal care. The participants were selected by systematic random sampling method. The tools of the study consisted of questionnaires, Cronbach’s alpha coefficient = 0.86, for collecting general information, prevention behavior of iodine deficiency in pregnant women and health belief model. Data were analyzed and presented by using descriptive statistics such as frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation, median, interquartile range, highest-lowest value, and inferential statistics by using chi-square test and also presenting for univariate analysis with a significance level of p-value at 0.05 and using 95 percent of confidence interval.

         The study results revealed that the iodine deficiency prevention of pregnant women was at a low level of 81.63 percent and the overall health belief model was at a good level of 51.02 percent. When considering each aspect, there were several aspects including the perception of risk to get the iodine deficiency disease, perception of severity of the disease, and perception of benefit to prevent iodine deficiency disease which were perceived as at good levels with 50.00, 54.08 and 50.00 percent respectively. The percentage perceived at a low-level, 78.33 percent, was the perception of obstacle to prevent iodine deficiency disease. When testing the result of the relationship between health belief model and prevention behavior of iodine deficiency, it had a significant relationship (p-value = 0.0464). It could be suggested that the promotion of pregnant women to prevent iodine deficiency behavior by providing health education programs in the parent school as well as using a calendar to record behavior supported by women’ husbands and relatives in practicing of preventing iodine deficiency should be concerned.