الفهرس 
The postpartum periodOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
The postpartum period is a very special phase in the life of the mother and her newborn. For women experiencing childbirth for the first time, it marks probably the most significant and life-changing event they have yet experienced. It is marked by strong emotions, dramatic physical changes, new and altered relationships, and the assumption of and adjustment to new roles. It is a time of making great demands on a woman’s resilience and capacity to adapt (Simian,2015). The postpartum period is a term in which a new member participates in the family and a new order is established. During this period, the mother complies with being pregnant, the new order, and changes in body image. Furthermore, the mothers may have physical and psychological problems such as breast problems, infection, insomnia, fatigue, stress, hemorrhoids, and feeling of inadequacy in the care of the newborn, inconsistency, post-partum depression. All these problems regarding the postpartum period may affect negatively the life quality of mothers(Özdemir et al., 2018).
The present studies are aimed at assessing the effect of Orem’s self-care intervention on quality of life and performance of self-care among primipara postpartum women than before. The aims are to assess the effect of Orem’s self-care intervention on the quality of life among postpartum women. The quasi-experimental design was used to fulfill the aim of the study. The data were gathered from the Obstetrics and Gynecology departments at Menoufia University Hospital and Shebin El-Kom Teaching Hospital in Shebin-El-Kom. A convenience sample of 100 postpartum women was selected.
Data was collected through the following:
A structured interviewing questionnaire: was developed by the researcher to obtain complete data concerning sleep quality and self-care of postpartum women.
It included three parts:
Part I: Sociodemographic data: It included age, educational level, occupation, telephone number, and marital status.
Part II: Data about the current pregnancy: It included the course of the present pregnancy and gestational age per week.
A Standardized Quality of Life (SQOL) Questionnaire: It was adapted from Ware and Sherburne (1992) and modified by the researcher to assess the postpartum woman`s quality of life. It was a structured interview questionnaire (short form). It consisted of six dimensions such as general health (3 items), limitation of activities (10 items), physical health problems (4 items), emotional health problems (3 items), pain perception (2 items), energy, and emotions (7 items). Each item was rated on a 3-point Likert scale.
Orem`s Self-Care Guidelines (OSCG) Checklist: it was adapted from Orem (1991) and modified by the researcher to assess the basic self-care needs of the study participants.
It contained questions about:
Part I: Self-care practice to meet the universal needs of postpartum women such as nutrition, elimination, rest, and sleep.
Part II: Self-care practice to meet a postpartum woman’s developmental requisites Rubin’s (2006) model, such as self-esteem, disturbed body image, and risk for infection.
Part III: Self-care practice to meet the health deviation requirements of postpartum women. This includes all minor discomforts of the postpartum period, such as stress incontinence (urinary), changes in comfort pain (perineum), and changes in comfort pain (breast). Approaches to ensuring ethics were considered in the study regarding confidentiality and the informed consent. Confidentiality was achieved by the use of closed sheets with the names of the participating women replaced by numbers. All women were informed that the information they provided during the study would be kept confidential and used only for statistical purpose and after finishing the study. The finding would be presented as a group data with no personal participant’s information remained.
Study fieldwork:
The current study was carried out in four phases: a preparatory phase, an interviewing phase, an implementation phase, and an evaluation phase.
The preparatory phase:
An extensive review concerning the study had been conducted involving an electronic dissertation, available books, and articles. A review of the literature to formulate a knowledge base relevant to the study area has also been done.Planning phase
Data were collected from postpartum women at Menoufia University Hospital and Shebin El-Kom Teaching Hospital over a six-months period (January 2021 to June 2020).
The implementation phase
The data were collected from the postpartum women at home on the fourth day after delivery
The data related to self-care were collected using instruments II and III; each woman’s knowledge gap and shortage of practices were discovered.
The postpartum women were provided with simple information regarding definition, physiological changes, and self-care guidelines; health care of the newborn; the problems that occur during the postpartum period for the mothers and the newborns; through an interviewing session using a booklet.
After two weeks, the postpartum women completed a post-test to assess their knowledge regarding self-care during the postpartum period and to evaluate what was done during the initial visit to see if the postpartum women were still experiencing sleep disturbances. The researcher discovered that some issues had been resolved while others had not.
After six weeks of the intervention, the postpartum women completed a follow-up test to assess their knowledge regarding self-care during the postpartum period, and a follow-up was done during the second visit to see if the postpartum women were still experiencing any problem. The researcher discovered that all problems were resolved.
Regarding the findings of the current study; there was a highly significant positive correlation between quality of life and Orem’s self-care after the intervention.
Conclusion
According to the findings of the present study, it can be concluded that the care provided using Orem self-care intervention during the postpartum period had a significant improvement in quality of life compared to women who didn’t receive it. This proved the first study hypothesis. Also, the care provided using Orem self-care intervention during the postpartum period lead to recovery of the postpartum problems. This proved the second study hypothesis. Thus, the findings of this study proved that Orem self-care intervention is an efficient care method during the postpartum period.
Recommendations
Based on the results of the current study, it was recommended that:
1. Health education for the postpartum women to enhance their ability to use self-care and hence improve their quality of life is necessary.
2. Training sessions are recommended for the postpartum women regarding how to apply Orem self-care to improve their quality of life.