The Woman-Centeredness of Various Dutch Maternity Service Providers During Antenatal and Postnatal Care

Fontein-Kuipers, Yvonne; van Beeck, Elise; Kammeraat, Liesbeth; Rutten, Fleur

Abstract

AIMS
To examine the woman-centeredness of maternity care providers from the woman's perspective. To investigate the validity and reliability of the Client Centered Care Questionnaire among a childbearing population.

DESIGN
A cross-sectional study.

METHODS
The self-report Client Centered Care Questionnaire was administered to evaluate women's one-on-one antenatal and postnatal care appointments with various Dutch care providers: community and hospital-based midwives, General Practitioners, (registrar) obstetricians, sonographers, and maternity care nurses.

RESULTS
Eight-hundred and fifteen completed questionnaires were received. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses provided support for a two-factor model, with an acceptable model fit. Woman-centeredness of all maternity care providers showed scores above baseline for the neutral value. Welch ANOVA showed a statistical significant effect of the type of maternity care practitioner in providing woman-centered care during antenatal and postnatal visits (F(5.8) = 7.79). The Bonferroni post hoc test showed that women assigned significantly higher woman-centered care scores to community-based midwives compared with hospital-based midwives (p .011) and compared with registrars/obstetricians (p < .001).

CONCLUSION
Although overall scores of perceived woman-centeredness indicated a good to excellent performance of woman-centered care, with significantly higher scores for community-based midwives, it cannot be assumed that current woman-centered care completely meets the needs of Dutch childbearing women. The Client Centered Care Questionnaire (CCCQ) is an adequate instrument to measure woman-centered care in antenatal and postnatal maternity services. Further research regarding measuring woman-centered care is needed.

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Jun 1, 2019
• Online Publication Date: Dec 23, 2019
• Publication Date: 2019
• Deposit Date: Jan 10, 2022
• Journal: International Journal of Childbirth
• Print ISSN: 2156-5287
• Electronic ISSN: 2156-5295
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 9
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 92-101
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1891/2156-5287.9.2.92
• Keywords: woman-centered care; client centered care questionnaire; antenatal care; postnatal care
• Public URL: http://researchrepository.napier.ac.uk/Output/2833233