Digital Media Use and Health Literacy Levels of Women in Turkey.

Obtaining information about women's use of digital media, their behavior in acquiring health information in the digital environment and their level of health literacy will fill an important gap in the literature. This research was conducted to examine the digital media use and health literacy levels of women in Turkey. The population of the research was the female population between the ages of 20-60 in Turkey in 2020, and the sample consisted of 404 women in this age range. The data of this analytical-cross-sectional study were collected online with the Personal Information Form and the Turkish Health Literacy Scale-32. It was determined that 83.9% of the women participating in the study used digital media and 82.9% of them obtained health information in the digital environment. In the categorical score distribution of the scale, it was determined that the health literacy level of 48.8% of women was insufficient, 26.2% problematic/limited, 19.8% sufficient and 5.2% excellent. A significant relationship was determined between women's health literacy level and age, marital status, education level, employment status, perception of income level, place of residence, use of digital media and duration of use (p < .05). We concluded that majority of women in Turkey use digital media, obtain health information in the digital environment and have low health literacy levels.

Investigation into the Relationship Between Women's Thoughts, Stigmatizing Attitudes, Beliefs, and Behaviors on Voluntary Abortion and Spiritual Well-Being in Turkiye.

INTRODUCTION: Although abortion can be implemented within the framework of legal rules and practices, the issue of abortion in socio-cultural, philosophical, and religious terms is one of the crucial issues that has been discussed since the existence of humanity. This study aims to examine the relationship between women's thoughts on voluntary abortion, their stigmatizing attitudes, beliefs, behaviors, and their spiritual well-being in Turkiye. METHOD: The sample of this analytical-cross-sectional study consisted of 300 women between the ages of 18 to 49 who had a telephone. Data were collected with the "Questionnaire Form, Functional Assessment of Chronic Illness Therapy Spirituality Well-Being (FACIT-Sp), and the Stigmatizing Attitudes, Beliefs and Actions Scale Toward Abortion (SABAS)." RESULTS: The findings showed that 30.3% of the women participating in this study had voluntary abortions. The FACIT-Sp total score of women who had voluntary abortion (12.58 ± 7.99) was significantly lower than those who did not have an abortion (29.02 ± 6.36), and the SABAS total score was not associated with having a voluntary abortion. A weak, positive linear relationship was found between FACIT-Sp and SABAS total scores (r = .115, p < .05). DISCUSSION: Study findings showed that there was a significant relationship between having had a voluntary abortion and a lower spiritual well-being score and there was a positive relationship between spiritual well-being and stigmatizing attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors toward abortion.

The relationship between women's climate change awareness and concerns about climate change in Turkiye.

OBJECTIVES: This study was conducted to examine the relationship between women's awareness of climate change and their worries about climate change in terms of women's health in Turkiye. STUDY DESIGN: Cross-sectional survey. METHODS: The research was conducted in a descriptive study design in the relational survey model. The sample of the study consisted of 321 women. Data were collected with the "Personal Information Form, Adaptation of Awareness to Climate Change Questionnaire, Climate Change Worry Scale." RESULTS: The total mean score of the Awareness to Climate Change Scale for Women was 2.32 ± 0.61 (moderate awareness), and the total mean score of the Climate Change Worry Scale was 2.76 ± 0.84 (moderate anxiety). There was a statistically significant, positive but weak relationship between women's worries about climate change and their awareness to climate change (r = 0.373, p < .001). CONCLUSIONS: As women's awareness to climate change increases, their worries about climate change increase.

Evaluation of Midwives' Perceptions of Spirituality and Spiritual Care in Aydin, Turkey.

Spirituality is an integral part of holistic care, but studies have revealed that the spiritual dimension of care is largely neglected in healthcare settings. This study evaluated midwives' perceptions of spirituality and spiritual care. The study is a cross-sectional design and was conducted from April 1 to June 30, 2018 in Aydin, Turkey. The research sample of the study contacted 101 midwives. The Spirituality and Spiritual Care Rating Scale were used to collect data. It was found that the midwives' perceptions of spirituality and spiritual care were affected by age, having children, family type, and working unit (p < 0.05).

Knowledge and attitudes of pregnant women about Coronavirus vaccines in Turkiye.

The aim of this cross-sectional study was to determine pregnant women's knowledge and attitudes regarding coronavirus vaccines in Turkiye. The research population consisted of 400 pregnant women who applied to a public hospital in this city. The data of the study was collected with the 'Personal Information Form' and 'Attitudes Towards COVID-19 Vaccine Scale'. Only 2% of the pregnant women stated that they wanted to receive coronavirus vaccines in their current pregnancy and 9.5% wanted it during the postpartum period. It has been concluded that the vast majority of pregnant women have insufficient knowledge and negative thoughts about coronavirus vaccines and the place where they live and their thoughts on the safety of coronavirus vaccines affect their positive attitudes about coronavirus vaccines.IMPACT STATEMENTWhat is already known on this subject? Many epidemics in history have been controlled or eliminated with vaccines. However, there is still insufficient evidence about the effects of coronavirus infection and vaccines on pregnant women.What do the results of this study add? As a result, it was found that the vast majority of pregnant women had insufficient knowledge and negative thoughts about coronavirus vaccines and very few of them wanted to receive the coronavirus vaccine during pregnancy and the postpartum period.What are the implications of these findings for clinical practice and/or further research? In the light of these findings, it is recommended that increase the vaccination rates in pregnant women by turning existing negative attitudes towards coronavirus vaccines in pregnant women into positive ones, providing accurate and effective information by health professionals and the media to eliminate negative attitudes caused by lack of information in pregnant women, conducting more studies on obstacles to increasing vaccine acceptance during pregnancy, and conducting studies on the subject with wider audiences and regions.

A systematic review to determine the anti-vaccination thoughts of pregnant women and the reasons for not getting vaccinated.

The aim of this study was to determine the anti-vaccination thoughts of pregnant women and the reasons for not getting vaccinated. In this study, data was obtained by retrospectively scanning the cross-sectional and qualitative studies published in the databases of 'PubMed, Cochrane, EBSCOhost, ULAKBIM and Google Scholar' in Turkish and English languages between 2011-2021. The PRISMA method was used in the preparation of the systematic review. In the studies reviewed, it was determined that the rate of pregnant women who were against the vaccine ranged from 6.2% to 98.6%, and the opinions of pregnant women against vaccination and the reasons for not getting vaccinated are presented under seven themes. The results of the study were considered important in terms of showing that quality and important studies were carried out in the literature on the subject and that the data were presented.IMPACT STATEMENTWhat is already known on this subject? Today, with the global coronavirus pandemic, vaccines and their effects are on the agenda again. Especially in pregnant women, opposition to vaccination and not getting vaccinated have emerged for various reasons.What do the results of this study add? The anti-vaccine thoughts of the pregnant women and the reasons for not getting vaccinated were mostly as follows: insufficient level of knowledge, mistrust of vaccines, perception of low infection risk, misconceptions and beliefs about the safety, content, side effects and efficacy of vaccines, worry and fear about the side effects of vaccines, the thought that the vaccine will harm herself and the baby, causes arising from healthcare professionals, financial, temporal and logistical barriers.What the implications are of these findings for clinical practice and/or further research? Scientific studies that can provide comprehensive and strong evidence about vaccine hesitancy and its causes, methods of increasing social approval in vaccination, and solutions should be proposed in the light of these researches in the fight against vaccine rejection.

The impact of adolescent pregnancy on maternal and infant health in Turkey: Systematic review and meta-analysis.

OBJECTIVES: To examine the impact of adolescent pregnancy on maternal and infant health on the basis of studies conducted in Turkey. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Systematic reviews and meta-analyses of cross-sectional and case-control. A systematic scan was performed in January 2020 based on the keywords "adolescent pregnancy or teenage pregnancy and Turkey" in the electronic databases PubMed, Clinical Key, Science Direct, Web of Science, Google Scholar, National Thesis Center, DergiPark, Ulakbim, Turkish Medline and Turkish Clinics. Two of the authors carried out a scan independently of each other, making a selection of articles, performing data extraction and quality assessment procedures under the supervision of the senior researcher. RESULTS: The results of a total of 38 studies, of which twenty-three were cross-sectional and 15 were case-control, were compiled for the meta-analysis (adolescents: 20,768; control: 59,481). The results of the meta-analysis showed that the more common effects of adolescent pregnancies were preterm birth (OR: 2.12, p < 0.001), early membrane rupture (OR: 1.49, p < 0.001), anemia (OR: 2.60, p < 0.001), low birthweight/intrauterine growth retardation (OR: 2.06, p < 0.001), and fetal distress (OR: 1.78, p = 0.003). On the other hand, it was observed in the meta-analysis that childbirth by cesarean section (OR: 0.70, p < 0.001), gestational diabetes (OR: 0.35, p < 0.001), placenta previa (OR: 0.52, p = 0.01), polyhydramnios (OR: 0.52, p = 0.04) and macrosomia (OR: 0.54, p < 0.001) were less common among adolescents compared to adults. CONCLUSION: Our review revealed that adolescent pregnancy had an adverse impact on maternal and infant health in terms of preterm childbirth, early membrane rupture, anemia, low birthweight/intrauterine growth retardation, low Apgar scores and fetal distress.

The effect of mesenchymal stem cells and sildenafil on flap viability in perforator-based flaps for ischemia/reperfusion injury: An experimental study.

PURPOSE: In this study, we evaluated the individual and combined effects of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) and sildenafil citrate (SC) on the viability of pedicled perforator flaps in which ischemia/reperfusion injury developed after induction of primary ischemia. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Seven Sprague-Dawley rats were used as donors of cells. Rectangular flaps (7 × 7 cm2 ) were created featuring the right second epigastric musculocutaneous perforator in 63 male Sprague-Dawley rats. The animals were randomly divided into two experimental groups (based on the ischemia time of 4 or 8 hours) and a control group. Each of the experimental group was further divided into four subgroups with no treatment, subcutaneous administration of MSCs after termination of ischemia, intraperitoneal administration of SC after termination of ischemia, and combined MSCs and SC treatments at the end of the period of ischemia (n = 7 for each subgroup). A sham group with no-ischemia to flap was used as the control (n = 7). On day 7, viable areas on the flaps were calculated from photographs. The levels of the antioxidative enzymes, such as superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase (CAT), and glutathione peroxidase (GPX), were analyzed in tissue samples obtained from the most distal regions of the flap prior to ischemia and on day 7 after induction of ischemia. RESULTS: No difference was detected between the no-ischemia group and 4-hours SC-treated subgroup, 4-hours combined MSC and SC treated subgroup, 8-hours MSC-treated subgroup, or 8-hours SC-treated subgroup (P > 0.05). In 4-hours ischemia group, the viable flap area of combined MSC and SC treated subgroup was significantly greater than that of the ischemia subgroup (17.17 ± 12.56 cm2 vs. 7.24 ± 7.17 cm2 ; P = 0.015). However, in 8-hours ischemia group, the viable flap area of MSC- treated subgroup was significantly greater than that of the ischemia subgroup (2.69 ± 3.71 cm2 vs. 14.52 ± 8.57 cm2 ; P = 0.004). There were no significant differences in SOD, CAT, and GPX levels detected between no-ischemia group and any of the treated subgroups in 4- and 8-hours ischemia groups (P > 0.05). However, SOD, CAT, and GPX levels in the no-ischemia group were lower than that in 4-hours ischemia control subgroup or 8-hours ischemia control subgroup (P < 0.05). CONCLUSION: In this rat pedicled perforator based abdominal flap, we found that after primary ischemia, application of MSCs and SC, either individually or in combined form, significantly enhanced antioxidant enzyme levels compared with those in the control group, and provided protection against ischemia/reperfusion injury. The two treatments acted synergistically to protect against damage after 4 hours of ischemia, but either treatment alone more effectively enhanced viable flap area after 8 hours of ischemia, although some flap damage was apparent. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Microsurgery 36:402-409, 2016.