The Texas Medical Board and the Futility of Medical Exceptions to Abortion Bans.

This Viewpoint describes the failure of yet another state institution to generate meaningful guidance about medical exceptions to abortion bans.

Women's perspectives on disrespect and abuse during facility-based childbirth in Ethiopia: a qualitative study.

BACKGROUND: Disrespect and abuse violates women's basic human rights and autonomy and can traumatize women who are already in a vulnerable position during childbirth and deter them from utilizing skilled care for future childbirth. This study explored women's perspectives on the acceptability of disrespect and abuse during facility-based childbirth in Ethiopia. METHODS: A qualitative descriptive design using five focus group discussions and fifteen in-depth, semi-structured, interviews was conducted with women between October 2019 to January 2020 in north Showa zone of Oromia region, central Ethiopia. Using purposive sampling, women who had given birth at public health facilities of North Showa zone during the twelve months preceding data collection were recruited, regardless of birth outcome. Inductive thematic analysis using Open Code software was used to explore the perspectives of participants. RESULTS: While women reject disrespectful and abusive acts during childbirth generally, they may consider some disrespectful acts as acceptable and or necessary under certain circumstances. Four emerging themes were identified. (1) Disrespect and abuse is not acceptable, (2) Disrespectful and abusive actions are acceptable only if intended to save lives, (3) Disrespectful and abusive actions are an accepted part of everyday practice to prevent complications and adverse outcomes, (4) Disrespectful and abusive actions are necessary to discipline disobedient women. CONCLUSION: Women's perceptions of disrespectful and abusive acts of care providers is deeply rooted within the context of violence in Ethiopia and the societal hierarchies that have systematically disempowered women. Given the pervasiveness of disrespect and abusive actions during childbirth, policymakers, clinical managers and care providers must take these essential contextual and societal norms into account and devise comprehensive clinical interventions that addresses the root causes.

Manifestations, responses, and consequences of mistreatment of sick newborns and young infants and their parents in health facilities in Kenya.

BACKGROUND: Despite efforts to incorporate experience of care for women and newborns in global quality standards, there are limited efforts to understand experience of care for sick newborns and young infants. This paper describes the manifestations, responses, and consequences of mistreatment of sick young infants (SYIs), drivers, and parental responses in hospital settings in Kenya. METHODS: A qualitative formative study to inform the development of strategies for promoting family engagement and respectful care of SYI was conducted in five facilities in Kenya. Data were collected from in-depth interviews with providers and policy makers (n = 35) and parents (n = 25), focus group discussions with women and men (n = 12 groups), and ethnographic observations in each hospital (n = 64 observation sessions). Transcribed data were organized using Nvivo 12 software and analyzed thematically. RESULTS: We identified 5 categories of mistreatment: 1) health system conditions and constraints, including a) failure to meet professional standards, b) delayed provision of care; and c) limited provider skills; 2) stigma and discrimination, due to provider perception of personal hygiene or medical condition, and patient feelings of abandonment; 3) physically inappropriate care, including providers taking blood samples and inserting intravenous lines and nasogastric tubes in a rough manner; or parents being pressured to forcefully feed infants or share unsterile feeding cups to avoid providers' anger; 4) poor parental-provider rapport, expressed as ineffective communication, verbal abuse, perceived disinterest, and non-consented care; and 5) no organized form of bereavement and posthumous care in the case of infant's death. Parental responses to mistreatment were acquiescent or non-confrontational and included feeling humiliated or accepting the situation. Assertive responses were rare but included articulating disappointment by expressing anger, and/or deciding to seek care elsewhere. CONCLUSION: Mistreatment for SYIs is linked to poor quality of care. To address mistreatment in SYI, interventions that focus on building better communication, responding to the developmental needs of infants and emotional needs for parents, strengthen providers competencies in newborn care, as well as a supportive, enabling environments, will lead to more respectful quality care for newborns and young infants.

Health Equity Morbidity and Mortality Conferences in Obstetrics and Gynecology.

Maternal mortality and morbidity continue to occur at unacceptably high levels in the United States, with communities of color experiencing significantly higher rates than their White counterparts, even after adjustment for confounding factors such as socioeconomic status. Many obstetrics and gynecology departments across the country have begun to incorporate routine discussion and analysis of health equity into peer review and educational processes, including grand rounds and morbidity and mortality conferences. Despite the desire and drive, there is little published guidance on best practices for incorporation of an equity component into these conferences. This document outlines the current processes at four academic institutions to highlight the variety of ways in which health equity and social justice can be incorporated when analyzing patient experiences and health outcomes. This commentary also provides a list of specific recommendations based on the combined experiences at these institutions so that others across the country can incorporate principles of health equity into their peer-review processes.

Between a woman and her fetus: Bedouin women mediators advance the health of pregnant women and babies in their society.

INTRODUCTION: Bedouin women in Israel confront a challenging circumstance between their traditional patriarchal society and transition to modernity. In terms of reproductive health, they face grave disparities as women, pregnant women and mothers. In this article we aim to understand the challenges of Bedouin women who work as mediators in the promotion of Bedouin women's perinatal health. We explore their challenges with the dual and often conflictual role as health peer-instructors-mediators in mother-and-child clinics, and also as members of a Bedouin community, embodying a status as women, mothers, and family caretakers. Drawn upon a feminist interpretative framework, the article describes their challenges in matters of perinatal health. Our research question is: how do women who traditionally suffer from blatant gender inequality utilize health-promotion work to navigate and empower themselves and other Bedouin women. METHODS: Based on an interpretive feminist framework, we performed narrative analysis on eleven in-depth interviews with health mediators who worked in a project in the Negev area of Israel. The article qualitatively analyses the ways in which Bedouin women mediators narrate their challenging situations. RESULTS: This article shows how difficult health mediators' task may be for women with restricted education who struggle for autonomy and better social and maternal status. Through their praxis, women mediators develop a critical perspective without risking their commitments as women who are committed to their work as well as their society, communities, and families. These health mediators navigate their ways between the demands of their employer (the Israeli national mother and child health services) and their patriarchal Bedouin society. While avoiding open conflictual confrontations with both hegemonic powers, they also develop self-confidence and a critical and active approach. CONCLUSIONS: The article shows the ways by which the mediator's activity involved in perinatal health-promotion may utilize modern perinatal medical knowledge to increase women's awareness and autonomy over their pregnant bodies and their role as caregivers. We hope our results will be applicable for other women as well, especially for women who belong to other traditional and patriarchal societies.

Psychometric properties of a Persian version of respectful maternity care questionnaire.

BACKGROUND: Providing high quality and respectful care during pregnancy and birth is one of the ways to reduce complications in women. Respectful care is a type of care that requires a valid instrument to measure. This study was conducted to determine the validity and reliability of the Persian version of the Respectful Maternity Care (RMC) questionnaire in 2018. METHODS: This study was performed with 150 women (in the first 48 h after birth), who were admitted in the postpartum wards of public hospitals from 1st January until 6th April 2018 in Zanjan city in Iran. Participants were selected randomly using the Poisson distribution (Time) sampling method. After receiving permission from the questionnaire's author, the internal consistency of the tool was measured by Cronbach's alpha coefficient after the Forward translation of the Persian version of the tool under expert supervision. The reliability of the modified questionnaire was assessed using a test-retest method in 10 eligible postpartum women, who completed the same questionnaire again after 72 h. The validity of the tool was confirmed by exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis using LISREL and SPSS software. RESULTS: The original RMC tool achieved an overall high internal reliability (α = 0.839). Confirmatory factor analysis of original RMC scores demonstrated poor fit indices. In LISREL proposed paths for the model, one item was excluded and a re-exploratory factor analysis was performed with the remaining 14 items. Four new subscales were defined for the revised tool including Abusive Care, Effective Care, Friendly Care, and Respectful Communication, which explained 60% of the variance. CONCLUSIONS: The revised tool included four subscales of Abusive Care, Effective Care, Friendly Care, and Respectful Communication in 14 items which explained 60% of the variance. Given the importance of providing high quality maternity care, and the variety of cultures and birth services across different countries, further research is needed on this RMC tool to evaluate its use in other countries and regions.

Ethical challenges for women's healthcare highlighted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Healthcare policies developed during the COVID-19 pandemic to safeguard community health have the potential to disadvantage women in three areas. First, protocols for deferral of elective surgery may assign a lower priority to important reproductive outcomes. Second, policies regarding the prevention and treatment of COVID-19 may not capture the complexity of the considerations related to pregnancy. Third, policies formulated to reduce infectious exposure inadvertently may increase disparities in maternal health outcomes and rates of violence towards women. In this commentary, we outline these challenges unique to women's healthcare in a pandemic, provide preliminary recommendations and identify areas for further exploration and refinement of policy.

Desafios do processo gestacional de mulheres negras: uma revisão narrativa / Challenges in the gestational process of black women: hia narrative review

Esta revisão narrativa procura discutir aspectos concernentes ao processo gestacional de mulheres negras, quais sejam: se existem diferenças de tratamento entre mulheres brancas e negras durante a gravidez e nos momentos do parto e pós-parto, como essas diferenças são influenciadas pelos aspectos fisiológicos de cada grupo étnico e como isso afeta as taxas de morbimortalidade. Para esta revisão, quatro bases de dados foram usadas (SciELO, LILACS, PubMed e MEDLINE) e 23 artigos foram lidos na íntegra, depois de selecionados por data de publicação, língua, país da pesquisa e análise dos títulos e resumos. Como principais resultados, os autores encontraram diferenças claras entre mulheres brancas e negras quanto ao acesso à saúde, sendo as negras mais propensas a usar os sistemas públicos e ter menos consultas pré-natal. Também foi observado que as mulheres negras reportaram maus-tratos mais vezes, tinham maiores chances de serem proibidas de ter um acompanhante durante o parto e recebiam menos anestesia para episiotomias. As características fisiológicas também foram apontadas várias vezes. Nesse sentido, altas taxas de anemia ferropriva e hipertensão durante a gravidez foram mais comuns entre as negras. Além disso, em se tratando de taxas de morbimortalidade, mulheres negras tinham uma chance consideravelmente maior de serem readmitidas pós-parto e maiores taxas de mortalidade, quando comparadas com mulheres brancas.(AU)

This review aims to discuss aspects related to the gestational process of black women, namely: if there is a difference in how black and white women are treated throughout pregnancy, partum and postpartum moments, how this difference is influenced by the physiological aspects of each ethnical group and how it affects their morbidity and mortality rates. For this review, four databases were used (SciELO, LILACS, PubMed and MEDLINE) and 23 articles were fully read, after being selected by publishing date, language, country of research, title and abstract analysis. The authors found as the main results clear differences between black women's and white women's access to health care, as black women are more likely to use public health care systems and have fewer prenatal appointments. It was also noticed that black women reported maltreatment more frequently, had a higher chance of being prohibited from keeping a companion during labor and suffering from less local anesthesia for episiotomy. The physiological characteristics were also pointed out several times, with high rates of iron deficiency anemia and hypertension during pregnancy being more common among black women. Moreover, when it comes to morbidity and mortality rates, black women had an extremely higher chance of being readmitted postpartum, and a higher mortality rate, when compared to white women.(AU)

Disrespect and Abuse during Childbirth in Ethiopia: A Systematic Review.

BACKGROUND: Disrespect and abuse are recognized for the restricting impact of women from seeking maternal care, psychological humiliations, grievances, and unspoken sufferings on women during childbirth. Individual primary studies are limited in explaining of extent of disrespect and abusive care. Hence, this review considers the synthesis of comprehensive evidence on the extent, contributing factors, and consequences of disrespectful and abusive intrapartum care from the women's and providers' perspectives in Ethiopia. METHODS: Articles had been systematically searched from the databases of PubMed, Cochrane Library, POPLINE, Google Scholar, HINARI, African Journals Online, and WHO Global Health Library. A qualitative and quantitative synthesis was performed using the Bowser and Hill landscape analytical framework. RESULT: Twenty-two studies comprised of the 16 quantitative; 5 qualitative and one mixed studies were included. The most repeatedly dishonored right during facility-based childbirth in Ethiopia was nondignified care, and the least commonly reported abuse was detention in health facilities. These behaviors were contributed by normalization of care, lack of empowerment and education of women, weak health system, and lack of training of providers. Women subjected to disrespectful and abusive behavior distanced themselves from the use of facility-based childbirth-related services and have endured psychological humiliations. CONCLUSION: Disrespectful and abusive care of women during childbirth is repeatedly practiced care in Ethiopia. This result specifically described the contributing factors and their effects as a barrier to the utilization of facility-based childbirth. Therefore, to overcome this alarming problem, health systems and care providers must be responsive to the specific needs of women during childbirth, and implementing policies for standard care of respectful maternity care must be compulsory. In addition, observational, qualitative, and mixed types of studies are required to provide comprehensive evidences on disrespect and abusive behavior during childbirth in Ethiopia.

Moral and mental health challenges faced by maternity staff during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The current COVID-19 pandemic places maternity staff at risk of engaging in clinical practice that may be in direct contravention with evidence; professional recommendations; or, more profoundly, deeply held ethical or moral beliefs and values, as services attempt to control the risk of cross-infection. Practice changes in some settings include reduction in personal contacts for tests, treatments and antenatal and postnatal care, exclusion of birth partners for labor and birth, separation of mother and baby in the immediate postnatal period, restrictions on breastfeeding, and reduced capacity for hands-on professional labor support through social distancing and use of personal protective equipment. These enforced changes may result in increasing levels of occupational moral injury that need to be addressed at both an organizational and a personal level. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

Expanding the concept of the professional integrity of obstetrics during a public health emergency.

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has placed great demands on many hospitals to maximize their capacity to care for affected patients. The requirement to reassign space has created challenges for obstetric services. We describe the nature of that challenge for an obstetric service in New York City. This experience raised an ethical challenge: whether it would be consistent with professional integrity to respond to a public health emergency with a plan for obstetric services that would create an increased risk of rare maternal mortality. We answered this question using the conceptual tools of professional ethics in obstetrics, especially the professional virtue of integrity. A public health emergency requires frameshifting from an individual-patient perspective to a population-based perspective. We show that an individual-patient-based, beneficence-based deliberative clinical judgment is not an adequate basis for organizational policy in response to a public health emergency. Instead, physicians, especially those in leadership positions, must frameshift to population-based clinical ethical judgment that focuses on reduction of mortality as much as possible in the entire population of patients served by a healthcare organization.

Transforming intrapartum care: Respectful maternity care.

Respectful maternity care is recommended by the World Health Organization and refers to care that maintains dignity, privacy, confidentiality, ensures freedom from harm and mistreatment, and enables informed choice and continuous support during labour and childbirth. In this paper, we review the evidence of respectful maternity care and discuss considerations for professional practice for health care providers. While there is limited evidence on what type of interventions can improve respectful maternity care, promising skills development for providers has included training on values, transforming attitudes, and interpersonal communication. Within a health facility, enabling environments may be created by setting up quality improvement teams, monitoring experiences of poor treatment, mentorship, and improved working conditions for staff. In order to provide respectful care, health facilities and health systems must be structured in a way that supports and respects providers, and ensures adequate infrastructure and organisation of the maternity ward.

Pre-post implementation survey of a multicomponent intervention to improve informed consent for caesarean section in Southern Malawi.

OBJECTIVE: Surgical informed consent is essential prior to caesarean section, but potentially compromised by insufficient communication. We assessed the association between a multicomponent intervention and women's recollection of information pertaining to informed consent for caesarean section in a low-resource setting, thereby contributing to respectful maternity care. DESIGN: Pre-post implementation survey, conducted from January to June 2018, surveying women prior to discharge. SETTING: Rural 150-bed mission hospital in Southern Malawi. PARTICIPANTS: A total of 160 postoperative women were included: 80 preimplementation and 80 postimplementation. INTERVENTION: Based on observed deficiencies and input from local stakeholders, a multicomponent intervention was developed, consisting of a standardised checklist, wall poster with a six-step guide and on-the-job communication training for health workers. PRIMARY AND SECONDARY OUTCOME MEASURES: Individual components of informed consent were: indication, explanation of procedure, common complications, implications for future pregnancies and verbal enquiry of consent, which were compared preintervention and postintervention using χ2 test. Generalised linear models were used to analyse incompleteness scores and recollection of the informed consent process. RESULTS: The proportion of women who recollected being informed about procedure-related risks increased from 25/80 to 47/80 (OR 3.13 (95% CI 1.64 to 6.00)). Recollection of an explanation of the procedure changed from 44/80 to 55/80 (OR 1.80 (0.94 to 3.44)), implications for future pregnancy from 25/80 to 47/80 (1.69 (0.89 to 3.20)) and of consent enquiry from 67/80 to 73/80 (OR 2.02 (0.73 to 5.37)). After controlling for other variables, incompleteness scores postintervention were 26% lower (Exp(ß)=0.74; 95% CI 0.57 to 0.96). Recollection of common complications increased with 0.25 complications (ß=0.25; 95% CI 0.01 to 0.49). Recollection of the correct indication did not differ significantly. CONCLUSION: Recollection of informed consent for caesarean section changed significantly in the postintervention group. Obtaining informed consent for caesarean section is one of the essential components of respectful maternity care.

Healthcare providers' perspectives of disrespect and abuse in maternity care facilities in Nigeria: a qualitative study.

OBJECTIVES: To explore healthcare providers' perspectives of disrespect and abuse in maternity care and the impact on women's health and well-being. METHODS: Qualitative interpretive approach using in-depth semi-structured interviews with sixteen healthcare providers in two public health facilities in Nigeria. Interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed, and analysed thematically. RESULTS: Healthcare providers' accounts revealed awareness of what respectful maternity care encompassed in accordance with the existing guidelines. They considered disrespectful and abusive practices perpetrated or witnessed as violation of human rights, while highlighting women's expectations of care as the basis for subjectivity of experiences. They perceived some practices as well-intended to ensure safety of mother and baby. Views reflected underlying gender-related notions and societal perceptions of women being considered weaker than men. There was recognition about adverse effects of disrespect and abuse including its impact on women, babies, and providers' job satisfaction. CONCLUSIONS: Healthcare providers need training on how to incorporate elements of respectful maternity care into practice including skills for rapport building and counselling. Women and family members should be educated about right to respectful care empowering them to report disrespectful practices.

Humanizing birth in Tanzania: a qualitative study on the (mis) treatment of women during childbirth from the perspective of mothers and fathers.

BACKGROUND: While there has been a trend for greater number of women to deliver at health facilities across Tanzania, mothers and their family members continue to face mistreatment with respectful maternity care during childbirth being violated. The objective of this study was to describe the experience of mothers and fathers in relation to (mis) treatment during childbirth in Tanzania. METHODS: Using a qualitative descriptive design, 12 semi-structured interviews and four focus group discussions were held with mothers and fathers who were attending a postnatal clinic in the Lake Zone region of Tanzania. Mothers' age ranged from 20 to 45 years whereas fathers' age ranged from 25 to 60 years. Data were analyzed using a priori coding based on Bohren's et al. typology of the mistreatment of women during childbirth. RESULTS: Mothers reported facing mistreatment and disrespectful maternity care through verbal abuse (harsh or rude language and judgmental or accusatory comments), failure to meet professional standards of care (refused pain relief, unconsented surgical operations, neglect, abandonment or long delays, and skilled attendant absent at time of delivery), poor rapport between women and providers (poor communication, lack of supportive care, denied husbands presence at birth, denied mobility, denied safe traditional practices, no respect for their preferred birth positions), and health system conditions and constraints (poor physical condition of facilities, supply constraints, bribery and extortion, unclear fee structures). Despite some poor care, some mothers also reported positive birthing experiences and respectful maternity care by having a skilled attendant assistance at delivery, having good communication from nurses, receiving supportive care from nurses and privacy during delivery. CONCLUSION: Despite the increasing number of deliveries occurring in the hospital, there continue to be challenges in providing respectful maternity care. Humanizing birth care in Tanzania continues to have a long way to go, however, there is evidence that changes are occurring as mothers notice and report positive changes in delivery care practices.

Legal and Ethical Considerations during Maternal Death Surveillance and Response.

Maternal death surveillance and response (MDSR) is a promising strategy, to identify record and track key drivers of maternal deaths. Despite its potential in reducing maternal mortality, ethical and legal challenges need to be properly ascertained and acted upon, to guarantee its acceptability, sustainability, and effectiveness. This paper proposes a legal and ethical framework to guide practitioners and researchers through the MDSR process. Three (03) categories of both legal and ethical issues are discussed: namely the issues related to data, people and use of findings. Most challenges of the MDSR strategy have ethical and legal underappraisal origins, the most outstanding being the low maternal death notification rates. Efforts should be made for respondents to properly understand the rationale for the process, and how the data obtained will be put into use. Dispelling fears of possible litigation remains fundamental in obtaining quality data. Health care providers involved in the process need to understand their ethical and legal responsibilities, as well as privileges (legal protection). It is hoped that this framework will offer a structure to guide professionals in improving MDSR implementation and research.