Abstract

Background: Education and consultation before marriage are opportunities to raise some matters among the pre-marriage couples. However, implementing any educational program requires a detailed identification of the needs of the target group, while failing to care for the expectations of this group of couples is a waste of money and manpower. Current study aimed to determine the needs for reproductive health literacy in pre-marriage couples. Method: A directed qualitative content analysis approach was conducted from June to December 2017 at Premarital Educational Center in Bandar Abbas (Iran), through in-depth semi-structured interviews with 11 pre-marriage peoples, and 13 married peoples who had got married maximally two years ago and participated in educational program, and 10 service providers that were selected through purposeful sampling. Sampling was continued until data saturation was reached. The MAXQDA 10 software was used for the management of data. Results: The themes were classified into four areas including sexual, physical, psychological-emotional and social needs for the reproductive health, and 10 main categories were obtained. The level of needs expressed for reproductive health literacy was at functional level and mostly associated with sexual health needs. Conclusions: Concerning the findings of the current work, the reform of the current educational content and the manner of its presentation to premarital couples for promotion of sexual and reproductive health is essential.