Pregnant women's thoughts before and after taking a COVID-19 PCR screening test

Abstract

Purpose

This study clarified what pregnant women who took a COVID-19 PCR screening test thought and feeling about the test.

Methods

Participants were 120 pregnant women who took a PCR screening test and received a negative result. The data were collected from web forms or questionnaires that the participants completed. The survey asked the following questions: their feelings when they learned that the PCR screening test was scheduled for them, their thoughts when they were given the explanation of the PCR screening test, changes in their feelings about the test before and after the explanation was given, their feelings until the test started, their feelings until receiving the result, their feelings after the result became available, their feelings about changing the delivery method if the result came back as positive, and their thoughts on whether the availability of the PCR screening test constitutes a factor in selecting a delivery facility. Answers for scales were analyzed by simple tabulation, and answers for open-ended questions were analyzed by extracting similar words from sentences the participants wrote and counting the number of participants who wrote each word.

Results

The number of questionnaires distributed was 120, and the valid responses was 92. A total of 92 subjects, including 1 teenagers, 21 in their twenties, 63 in their thirties, and 7 in their forties and over. 49 were primipara and 43 were multipara.

Pregnant women had negative emotions such as “anxiety” “nervous” before undergoing the PCR screening test. While waiting for their test results, pregnant women were hoping it wasn't positive.

After they got results, their heart felt at ease such as “secure” “great”. In addition, they felt that more attention to preventing infection.

Conclusion

It was found that most of pregnant women requested the PCR test, were satisfied with the explanation, and accepted the PCR test positively. On the other hand, they were psychologically uncomfortable until the test results became clear and were relieved that the result was known.