Family Planning Practices in Families with Children Affected by β-Thalassemia Major in Southern Iran

Abstract

Preventing the birth of children with β-thalassemia major (β-TM) is an important health issue. We investigated family planning practices and related factors among families with affected children. We selected a total of 569 parents from the parents of patients with β-TM who were registered at thalassemia referral clinics in southern Iran. Information was recorded regarding demographic variables, socioeconomic status and family planning practices. The correlations between family planning practice and related factors were evaluated. Approximately 96.0% of the parents (546) were practicing contraception at the time of the study. Only 12.8% of the families whose first child had β-TM decided to have no more children. The most frequent contraceptive method was tubal ligation (TL) (37.5%) followed by oral contraceptive pills (OCP) (31.5%). Higher education level of the mothers and higher economic status of the families were found to be related with the lower numbers of children with β-TM (p = 0.001). We found a high percentage of safe contraception being used by at-risk couples. It seems that educational programs have been effective in influencing family planning practices. Further attention should be devoted to increasing the knowledge of at-risk couples with a greater focus on parents of low socioeconomic status. Because of cultural factors in Iran, many of these at-risk couples opted to achieve the desired family size, so implementation of a well-organized prenatal diagnostic system seems necessary.

Family planning practices in couples with children affected by β-thalassemia major and its relationship with their education: An epidemiological study

“…The study had explored family planning practices and related factors of couples with β-TM children. In the present study, among sexually active couples, 44.8% were currently using family planning method to prevent the birth of another child, which was quite worse compared to Haghpanah et al [11] (96.0%) and Ishaq et al [12] (65.0%) but similar to findings of Mallik et al [10] (51.8%). The difference of findings may be contributed to the consequence of community-wide education programs, as well as comprehensive screening and counseling programs operational in those counties unlike India.…”

“…However, prior studies in this regard reported that despite having no desire for another child, there is high unmet need for family planning among parents of thalassemic children related to various factors such as education, religion, and economic status. [1112]…”

“…The study will also quantify strength of association of various factors with unmet need of family planning unlike prior studies in the topic which only explored significant-related factors ignoring their strength of association with the unmet need of family planning. [1112] Thus, the findings of the study will help policy makers of thalassemia burdened countries to design and prioritize interventions to meet unmet need for family planning of couples with children affected by β-TM to avert birth of a thalassemic.…”

Analysis of survival data in thalassemia patients in Shiraz, Iran

“…As a result, the number of newborns with beta-thalassemia has decreased, and the heavy financial burden of the disease has been mitigated by the relatively low-cost measures of premarital screening and genetic counseling [ 5 ]. However, some barriers, such as cultural factors, have hindered the implementation of a well-organized prenatal diagnostic system [ 6 ].…”

Preventing Thalasemia: Parents’ Awareness of Thalassemia

“…The contraceptives method would prevent pregnancy, and it is also useful for parents who did not know about an abortion program for the fetus less than 6 weeks who has been diagnosed with thalassemia. Haghpanah et al's (2013) stated that family planning and the usage of contraceptive is an effective program to prevent the birth of children with thalassemia. Wiradyana (2013) stated that determining gestational age less than 6 weeks for an abortion is quite difficult, because the prenatal diagnosis of thalassemia would be performed after 10 weeks' of gestation.…”