Genital Hygiene Behaviors Among Married Women and the Outcomes of Counseling Practices

Abstract

Objective: This study aimed to investigate the genital hygiene behaviors of married women and thecounseling provided based on the genital infection data that was obtained.Methods: This descriptive study was conducted on 146 women of age 18-49 years. The study was conductedin a training and research hospital located in Ankara. Data were collected using a data collection form includingquestions about socio-demographic characteristics, descriptive characteristics of participants regarding genitalhygiene of women (bathing, pad use, vaginal douching) and the Genital Hygiene Behaviors Inventory (GHBI). TheGHBI scores were analyzed with the Mann-Whitney U test (age, bathing, cleaning of genital region, usingdeodorant for genital region, vaginal douche, genital infection history) and the Kruskal-Wallis test (educationstatus, department where employed, type of underwear, frequency of sexual intercourse).Results: The mean age of the women was 39.0 ± 7.70 years. It was determined that 57.5% of women had avaginal douching and only 33.6% of women applied to the doctor for complaints of genital infection. The women’mean score on the GHBI was 84.95 ± 9.20. Women at the group of 41 years old and older, who were not having bathevery day and who were not performing the genital region cleaning properly were found to have lower GHBIscores (p