Introduction: Pregnancy is a natural period of women life cycle; it is also a time of physical and psychological changes that have to include pleasure, joy and hope feelings to women herself and her family. However, it can be a stressful period that facilitate the increasing of depression rate Aim of Study: the study aimed at finding out the prevalence rate of depression among Palestinian pregnant women and the related associated factors during the period of study Method: A quantitative cross-sectional study design was used to achieve the aim of the study. Data was collected from 327 pregnant women during the period of April to June 2016 from the Antenatal clinic in the 9 refugee camps distributed in the North, middle and southern regions of the West Bank. Self-administrative was used, it consisted of questions about demographic data, exposure to violence during pregnancy, availability of support person. to assess the depression level, depression scale from the patient health questionnaire -9 (PHQ-9) was used Results: the findings of study indicated the rate of depression among pregnant women was high. About 59.5% of pregnant women reported different level of depression, 2.1% 7 classified to have severe level of depression while 34% (111) classified having mild level of depression. The result also revealed that 57.1% of those who have a moderate degree of depression were exposed to sexual violence by their husband. Conclusion and Recommendation: Age group, exposure to violence, availability of support person and the number of pregnancies increasing are factors increasing the probability to develop depression during pregnancy. Findings suggest the need for detection of depression symptoms during the antenatal visits, and to provide support and protection for women. There is also a need for further study to be conducted in governmental clinics and using the qualitative approach. Keywords: Depression; Pregnancy; Violence; Trimester; Antenata

Title

Global Journal of Reproductive Medicine

Publisher

Juniper PUBLISHER

Publisher Country

United States of America

Publication Type

Prtinted only

Volume

7

Year

2020

Pages

50-56