Background:Postpartum blues is a transient change of moods occurring in the first few days after delivery. The present study aimed to investigate the effect of religious doctrines on postpartum blues in primiparous women.Materials and Methods:In this randomized controlled tria1, 84 primiparous women who had average or weak religious attitude were randomly divided into intervention and control groups. In the intervention group, religious doctrines were instructed from 20th to 28th weeks of gestation through 6 weekly sessions of 60–90 min each. The control group, however, just received the routine care. Spielberger's anxiety scale and the questionnaires assessing religious knowledge and attitude were completed by both groups before, immediately after, and 1–2 months after the intervention. Also, postpartum blues were evaluated by Edinburg Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) 10 days after delivery. Then, the data were analyzed using Chi-square, paired t-test, independent t-test, analysis of variance (ANOVA), and Pearson correlation coefficient.Results:The results showed postpartum blues in 59.5% of the study participants. Besides, the results of independent t-test revealed a statistically significant difference between the two groups regarding the mean score of postpartum blues (P = 0.036). Although the intervention group's knowledge and attitude scores were higher than those of the control group, no significant difference was found between the two groups regarding the correlation coefficient between postpartum blues and religious knowledge (P = 0.088) and religious attitude (P = 0.7).Conclusions:The results of the study show that instruction of religious doctrines was effective in increasing the religious knowledge and attitudes and reducing the postpartum blues.

Background:Anxiety is among the most common pregnancy complications. This study was conducted to examine the impact of religious teaching on anxiety in primiparous mothers referring to the selected perinatal clinics of Tehran University of Medical Sciences in 2013.Materials and Methods:This randomized clinical trial was conducted on the pregnant women in 20–28 weeks of gestation referring to the selected clinics of Tehran University of Medical Sciences from July 2013 to June 2014. The subjects were selected through simple random sampling and divided into religious education and control groups. To assess the individuals, a demographic questionnaire, an anxiety trait State-Trait Anxiety Inventory and a religious knowledge and attitude trait (pre- test and post-test and 1 or 2 months after the test) were filled in by the two groups. Training classes (religious knowledge and attitude trait) for the cases were held in 6 weeks, and the sessions lasted for 1½ h.Results:The knowledge and attitude scores showed significant differences in the controls and cases after the intervention (P = 0.001) and 2 months after the study (P = 0.001). According to the results of independent t-test, a significant difference was found in the state anxiety score (P = 0.002) and personal score (P = 0.0197) between the two groups before the intervention; however, the results were strongly significant different after the intervention and 2 months after the study (P ≤ 0.001).Conclusions:The improvement in the mothers’ knowledge and attitude in religious subjects will reduce anxiety in primiparas.