Effect of Cognitive-Behavioral Education on Fear of Childbirth During Pregnancy; a Clinical Trial

Aims: Fear of childbirth (FOB) in pregnant women is critical because it may affect prenatal outcomes. This study aimed to determine the effect of cognitive-behavioral education on fear of childbirth during pregnancy. Materials Methods: A clinical trial study with two intervention groups and one control group was conducted among nulliparous women visiting Gorgan health centers in the first six months of 2018. Among 211 nulliparous pregnant women, 104 with a FOB score of 55 or higher were divided into control and intervention groups. The women in the intervention group were randomly assigned to two groups. The first intervention group received conventional prenatal education, the second group received cognitive-behavioral techniques, and the control group received routine prenatal care. The data collection tool was the Wijma Delivery/Expectancy Fear of Childbirth Questionnaire (version A). The data were analyzed using SPSS version 18 and Chi-square, Fisher’s exact test, ANOVA, and Welch. Paired t-test, Wilcoxon tests, ANOVA, and Kruskal-Wallis tests. Findings: Comparing the rate of change in the scores of FOB indicated significant differences in all fields between the control and cognitive-behavioral techniques groups (p 0.05), but the conventional prenatal education group showed no significant difference (p 0.05). However, the control group exhibited a significant increase in all fields of FOB, while the cognitive-behavioral techniques group showed a significant reduction. Conclusion: FOB is reduced more in pregnant women with prenatal education based on cognitive-behavioral techniques than conventional education.