title: A Cross-sectional Study of Midwives' Perspectives Towards their Professional Educational Needs.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Midwives are one of the most important health care providers and meeting their professional educational needs can be effective in maternal and child health promotion.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  The aim of this study was to investigate the midwives' perspectives towards their educational needs.
  
  
  METHODS
  In this cross-sectional study which was conducted in 2012 in Sari, North of Iran, 223 midwives during a convenience sampling method expressed their educational needs. The instrument of the data collection was a self-administered 64-question researcher- made questionnaire about the participants' educational needs in 10 fields related to midwifery profession.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The mean age and employment record of the participants were 33.87±10.49 and 10.09±8.14 years respectively, and the majority (65.02%) of them was employed in the health care centers. Findings showed that the highest score of midwives' educational need was related to need to education about labor and delivery care (75.14±21.13%) which was followed by the need to education about pre marriage counseling (74.04±19.95%) and pre conception counseling (71.33±21.89%).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Owing to the emergence of new dimensions of tasks in midwifery practice and due to developing some changes in the educational needs of midwives, it's necessary to implement an updated educational package in order to deliver the recommended standards of care and to increase midwives' participation in continuing education programs.
authors.affiliation: Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences, Sari, Iran.
authors.forename: Kobra
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Abedian
authors.affiliation: Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences, Sari, Iran.
authors.forename: Jamshid Yazdani
authors.initials: JY
authors.lastname: Charati
authors.affiliation: Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences, Sari, Iran.
authors.forename: Keshvar
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Samadaee
authors.affiliation: Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences, Sari, Iran.
authors.forename: Zohreh
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Shahhosseini
keywords: continuing education; educational needs; midwives; needs assessment