TY - JOUR JF - Avicenna-J-Nurs-Midwifery-Care JO - Avicenna J Nurs Midwifery Care VL - 18 IS - 2 PY - 2010 Y1 - 2010/11/01 TI - Folic Acid Intake during Preconceptional Period TT - مصرف اسید فولیک قبل از بارداری N2 - Introduction & Objective: Folic acid a member of vitamin B complex has an important role in prevention of neural tube defects. The closure of neural folds occurs at 28th day of pregnancy and most of women are not informed about their pregnancy at this time, so folic acid supplementation must begin before pregnancy. This study conducted with the aim of determining preconception intake of folic acid. Materials & Methods: 322 womenwho hadterminated their pregnancy at Fatemieh hospital (Iran,Hamadan) were interviewed through a descriptive and analytical study. Data analysis was on the basis of SPSS software. Results:79.8% of pregnancies were planned and 90.4% of women had not mentioned folic acid usage before conception and only 9.6% of mothers had used folic acid in this way: 5% of them took it 3 months before conception, 1.5% from 2 months and 3.1% from one month preconception began the supplementation. There was a significant relation between preconception usage and education, employment, the number of abortions and receiving education (P= 0.000, P=0.001, P=0.004, P=0.000 respectively). Conclusions: Most of mothers have planned pregnancies but very few of them had took preconception folic acid supplementation so it is necessary to do some interventions for getting them to be familiar with folic acid and correct time of usage SP - 38 EP - 48 AU - H. Riazi, M.Sc., AU - S. Bashirian, M.Sc., AU - F. Cheraghi, Ph.D., AD - KW - Folic Acid / Neural Tube Defects / Preconception UR - http://nmj.umsha.ac.ir/article-1-1082-en.html ER -