Traditional practices for women during pregnancy and postpartum in Gaziantep province

This study was conducted as a descriptive research to determine of traditional practices for women during pregnancy and postpartum period in Gaziantep province. The research was conducted between July 2019 and February 2020 in Oğuzeli Central Family Health Center with institutional permissions. The sample of the study consisted of 150 women who were followed up in the postnatal period at the center specified between the dates of the study, gave birth in the last year, volunteer to participate in the study and could communicate in Turkish. In order to collect data in the study, the "Data Collection Form" developed by the researcher as a result of the literature review was used. The data were collected by the researcher through face-to-face interviews after the women were informed about the study and their consents were obtained. The statistical analysis of the data obtained from the research was done by using the IBM SPSS Statistics 22.0 package program; number and percentage representation in descriptive statistics, and Chi-square test for comparison of categorical variables were used. The most common traditional practices for the pregnancy period; estimating the sex of the baby with the structure of the pregnant belly (63.3%), the pregnant woman looking at a beautiful person (77.3%), not having a haircut (47.3%), walking to prepare for the birth (70.7%), eating quince (81.3%) and praying (54.6%). The most common traditional practices in the postpartum period; do not eat buttermilk and yoghurt for postpartum bleeding (70.0%), put Quran and amulet for hot flushes (82.7%), eat bulgur wheat to increase milk (82.7%), make the forties (90%, 7), not leaving the woman alone (85.3%) and praying (46.7%). 62.7% of the women stated that they found traditional practices somewhat important and 64% somewhat necessary. It was observed that 82.7% of the women used traditional practices during pregnancy and 88% of them during the postpartum period. Mostly mother-in-law (62.7%) was specified as the person who guided women to traditional practices. The rate of women with a small number of children to find traditional practices important was found to be significantly lower (p <0.05). The rate of using traditional practices during the postpartum period was found to be significantly high for women living in rural areas, who did not work and whose marriage duration was 6 years or more (p <0.05). According to the results obtained from the research, it was observed that women continued traditional practices during pregnancy and postpartum period. Nurses were advised to evaluate women during pregnancy and postpartum period in terms of traditional practices they applied, support beneficial practices and raise awareness among women. Key words: pregnancy, postpartum period, women, traditional practices, nursing