Title

Birth, bond and beyond: Maternal care experiences and contraceptive concerns among primipara postnatal mothers in an urban Indian community

Authors

Sumathi Murugaiyan¹, Shankar Shanmugam Rajendran^2,*, C Anbalagan Maruthan³, Gomathy Priya Venkatachalam¹, Karthika Devandiran¹, Premalatha Venkatesan¹ & Arockia Vinolia Amalraj¹

Affiliation

¹Department of Community Health Nursing, College of Nursing, Madras Medical College, The TN Dr MGR Medical University, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India; ²Department of Nursing Research, College of Nursing, Madras Medical College, The TN Dr MGR Medical University, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India; ³Department of Pediatrics, College of Nursing, Madras Medical College, The TN Dr MGR Medical University, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India; *Corresponding author

Email

Sumathi Murugaiyan - E-mail: sumathimary81@gmail.com
Shanmugam Rajendran - E-mail: shankarshaki@yahoo.com
C Anbalagan Maruthan - E-mail: anbalagan.avi@gmail.com
Gomathy Priya Venkatachalam - E-mail: kgksavan@gmail.com
Karthika Devandiran - E-mail: karthika.d38@gmail.com
Premalatha Venkatesan - E-mail: prems00005@gmail.com
Arockia Vinolia Amalraj - E-mail: vinoliaxavier86@gmail.com

Article Type

Research Article

Date

Received August 1, 2026; Revised August 31, 2026; Accepted August 31, 2026, Published August 31, 2026

Abstract

The postpartum period presents unique maternal-care and contraceptive challenges for first-time mothers. Therefore, it is of interest to assess the maternal care experiences and contraceptive concerns among 60 primiparous postnatal mothers in urban Chennai, with qualitative interviews conducted among six participants. Thematic analysis identified institutional support, family support and physical challenges as the major maternal-care experiences. Overall, 83.33% of mothers reported moderate contraceptive concerns, 16.67% high concerns and negative beliefs were common, with concern levels significantly associated with age, education, occupation and antenatal visits (p ≤ 0.05). Thus, integrating culturally sensitive, nurse-led contraceptive counselling into routine antenatal and postnatal care may improve knowledge, address misconceptions and promote informed contraceptive decision-making.

Keywords

Primipara, postpartum period, contraception, family planning, maternal health, nursing assessment

Citation

Murugaiyan et al. Bioinformation 22(8): 5261-5264 (2026)

Edited by

Ritik Kashwani

ISSN

0973-2063

Publisher

Biomedical Informatics

License

This is an Open Access article which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited. This is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License.