Educational needs of midwife alumni work in health care centers

Determination of educational needs is the first step in educational planning and the first factor of ensuring the quality and efficacy of education process. Midwives’ sufficient knowledge and improvement of their decision-making will lead to performance progress. The a im of this study was determining the educational needs of midwives working in hospitals and healthcare centers of Chaharmahal & Bakhtiari province. This cross-sectional study was performed on 280 midwives and 50 healthcare center authorities of hospitals and healthcare centers of Chaharmahal & Bakhtiari who were selected by census sampling method in 2009. Data was collected by a researcher-made questionnaire containing three sections of demographic characteristics, educational needs related to their specialty or general domains and priority in educational needs. Data were analyzed by descriptive statistics and Chi-square, student T-test and one-way ANOVA using SPSS 15 software. There wasn’t significant difference in the average scores of educational needs in specific and general domains from authorities and midwives’ point of view (p>0.05). There was a significant relationship between the average score of educational needs and work place in obstetrics (p=0.002), maternal and child health (p=0.038) and neonatal (p=0.025) domains. There was a significant relationship between the average score of educational needs and the academic level of education in general domains (p=0.025). Holding educational classes of English, use of Information Technology (IT) in obstetrics, resuscitation, research methodology, religious and legal commandments, abnormal uterine bleeding, hypertensive disorders, neonatal medical treatment and common gynecologic infections seems essential as educational priorities.