Affecting Factors of Parturient Women s Privacy Preservation in The Maternity Ward: A Qualitative Study

Objective: Different factors have an important role in the positive and negative childbirth experiences of the mothers. The parturient mother s privacy preservation is one of the factors for increasing the mothers satisfaction consistent with natural childbirth. Hence, this study aimed to investigate the factors affecting the parturient mother s privacy preservation. Materials and methods: Content analysis was used in this qualitative study that is based on the semi structured individual interviews with women who had experienced natural vaginal delivery, midwives, and the specialist in a maternity ward from 2018 to 2021 in Shahroud, Iran. The collected data were analyzed simultaneously with the sampling procedure using a fivestep qualitative content analysis method. To ensure the robustness of the data, Lincoln and Guba s four criteria (credibility, dependability, confirmability, and transferability) were used. Results: The findings of the study with 40 participants resulted in the extraction of 28 codes, 9 subcategories, and 2 main categories entitled extraand intra personal factors affecting the mother s privacy. Conclusion: To foster the mother s awareness of her rights and privacy during pregnancy and delivery, continuous education, monitoring, and evaluating both the students and the staff to respect preserving the mother s privacy is necessary to develop an instrument to measure the preservation of the mother s privacy in the maternity ward.