Menopause experiences of women in rural areas.

AIM: This paper is a report of a study to explore the menopause experiences of women living in rural areas. BACKGROUND: The menopausal phase can be physically and emotionally unsettling in a woman's life. Evidence has shown that a woman's ability to cope with the stresses of menopause can be enhanced through education and social support, yet there is a paucity of research in relation to the experiences of menopausal women in rural areas, where access to supportive services is often limited. METHOD: Naturalistic inquiry was used to explore the experiences of 25 menopausal women who were living in rural areas in Nova Scotia, Canada. Participants were interviewed in focus group and individual sessions, conducted during 2006. Verbatim transcripts of the interviews were analysed using thematic analysis. FINDINGS: Women living in rural communities described a need to understand fully the intensity of menopause-related symptoms, including changes to their physical and mental wellbeing. Participants described struggling to sift through excessive and conflicting information from a variety of venues and identified a need to receive reliable information from sources they trusted. They described the menopause experience as having a significant impact on their personal relationships and identified social support and humour as their primary coping strategies. CONCLUSION: Menopause is a significant life event affecting millions of women globally. Nurses are uniquely situated to provide comprehensive women's health care and must employ innovative strategies to provide support to women living in rural communities to enhance both health and wellbeing as they transition through menopause and as they age.

The spiritual experience of high-risk pregnancy.

OBJECTIVE: To uncover the spiritual beliefs and practices of women experiencing high-risk pregnancies. DESIGN: Qualitative, naturalistic inquiry via face-to-face, semistructured interviews, with thematic analysis of interview transcripts. SETTING: A prenatal special care unit of a tertiary health centre. PARTICIPANTS: A purposeful sample of 12 women admitted for high-risk pregnancy complications. RESULTS: Analysis of the women's interviews uncovered the following themes: high-risk pregnancy as a challenge, seeking a spiritual language, what makes you who you are, and everything will be OK. CONCLUSIONS: Findings from this study highlight that within the challenges of a high-risk pregnancy, the women often struggled to define their spirituality yet recognized spiritual expression as key to their health and healing. Each woman identified aspects of their spirituality that enabled them and their families to deal with the stress of their high-risk pregnancy experience, which they believed enhanced outcomes for themselves and their unborn child.

Spirituality and high-risk pregnancy: another aspect of patient care.

A high-risk pregnancy can be a stressful situation for a woman, her partner and her family. Many women utilize their spiritual beliefs as a way to make sense of their situation. Health care professionals, including nurses, midwives and physicians, can provide effective spiritual care and support consistent with their professional scopes of practice. Spiritually focused interventions can help to reduce stress and anxiety and create a more open and confident approach to the management of pregnancy complications.