Traditional practices in the postpartum period among Syrian refugee and Turkish women: A comparative study.

In this study, we examined the use of traditional postpartum practices among Turkish and Syrian refugee women within the framework of Transcultural Nursing Theory. Data were collected from 260 women through face-to-face questionnaires on sociodemographic characteristics, reproductive history, and traditional practices. Our results showed cultural differences: Turkish women often sought professional care, obtained postpartum information from nurses or midwives, and practiced rituals such as the forty-day bath, yellow cloth covering, and religious ceremonies. Syrian women reported more pregnancies, relied on social networks, and used practices such as salting the newborn, applying kohl, and lemon drops. Nurses should address cultural beliefs while promoting safe, evidence-based care. Postpartum health practices among migrant, refugee, and host-community women represent a complex intersection of cultural heritage, socio-psychological transition, and structural healthcare barriers that resonate globally. Rather than merely reiterating the global displacement of refugees in this research, we analyze how displaced populations negotiate cultural care preservation versus restructuring when adapting to host healthcare systems. Specifically, we compare the postpartum traditional practices of Syrian refugee women and Turkish host-community women. In doing so, we explicitly intend to make a practice and theoretical contribution to the global maternal care literature. We offer this comparison as an analytical framework for an international, interdisciplinary audience of sociologists, public health scholars, and nursing professionals. We demonstrate how deeply embedded cultural beliefs (such as newborn salting or ritual baths) can be safely negotiated (accommodation) or healthily modified (repatterning) in diverse clinical settings worldwide. By evaluating these practices through Leininger's Transcultural Nursing Theory, we show how local maternal care insights can be elevated to inform transcultural healthcare policies and clinical education in other nations facing significant migration flows.