Women's views and experiences of maternity care during COVID-19 in Ireland: A qualitative descriptive study.
Sunita Panda, Deirdre O'Malley, Paula Barry and 2 others
PMID 34325384WHAT IT FOUND
Women described postnatal support as hard to navigate, with home visits sometimes stopping and breastfeeding help hard to access, with booklets, websites, or video calls.
Partner restrictions made labour lonely, yet quiet wards and fewer visitors helped some women bond.
Key findings
01Postnatal support was hard to navigate: some women had to travel to a health centre when public health nurse home visits stopped, and breastfeeding help was hard to access, with booklets, websites, or video calls.
02Partner restrictions made early labour feel lonely, with some partners waiting in the car park for up to 12 hours, and all 19 women said their partner missed bonding with the baby in the first days.
03Some women valued restricted visiting because it made postnatal wards quieter, gave privacy for breastfeeding, and reduced unexpected visitors at home.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
The study included only 19 women from one Irish hospital, all aged 30 or older, all Irish, and all well enough to take part. Women whose babies were admitted to neonatal intensive care were not represented. The sample was self-selected after a postal invitation. Interviews were all by telephone, and the findings are themes from experiences, not evidence about how many women were affected or what care outcomes occurred.
Declared interests
Funded by Trinity College Dublin's Office of the Dean of Research COVID-19 Response Fund. The authors declared no competing financial interests or personal relationships.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read the positive themes as evidence that visiting restrictions improve maternity care. This study reports experiences from 19 self-selected women in one Irish hospital, all aged 30 or older, all Irish, and all medically well at recruitment, so it cannot show effects.