Tagged / CMMPH

BU midwifery research at the international Normal birth research conference

The Normal birth research conference is an annual, international event that takes place to focus on less complicated aspects of pregnancy and birth. This year it took place in the beautiful surroundings of Grange-over-sands overlooking Morecambe bay and on the edge of the Lake District. On this occasion there were delegates from over 20 countries including Canada, USA, New Zealand, Australia, Brazil, Poland, Spain, the Netherlands, Sweden, Norway and India! The attendees included midwives, obstetricians, birth supporters, architects, artists, geographers and educators as well as representatives of the World Health organisation, charities and Baroness Cumberlege from the UK House of Lords.

Sara Stride, Jenny Hall, and Jane Fry at the conference

Research at Bournemouth University was well represented from CMMPH, CQR and CEL. Midwifery lecturer, Sara stride, on behalf of the research team of Professor Vanora Hundley and Dr Sue Way, presented a poster of their work, ‘a qualitative study to explore UK midwives’ individual practice, beliefs and attitudes regarding perineal care at the time of birth’. Dr Jane Fry, also from the midwifery team, presented a research topic on her Doctoral work, ‘ A descriptive phenomenological study of independent midwives’ use of intuition as an authoritative form of knowledge during women’s labours and births’.  She also facilitated a workshop titled ‘ Finding your own intuition: a workshop designed to explore practitioners’ ways of knowing during childbirth’ .

 

Jenny Hall with Professor Susan Crowther at the book launch [(c) Sheena Byrom]

Dr Jenny Hall presented a research topic based on recent research with Dr Bethan Collins from Liverpool University, Professor Vanora Hundley and Jilly Ireland, midwife and visiting researcher, ‘How can we improve the ‘normal’ childbirth experience of disabled women?’. She also facilitated a workshop with a colleague from RGU, Aberdeen, Professor Susan Crowther, ‘Spirituality and childbirth: bringing a felt-sense into childbirth- a co-operative inquiry’. In addition, her new internationally authored book jointly edited with Professor Crowther, ‘Spirituality and Childbirth: Meaning and care at the start of life’, was officially launched at the conference.

The impression taken away was the passion and importance of more evidence required around more ‘normal’ aspects of pregnancy and birth, especially in countries with less resources. There is considerable humanising of care being carried out internationally, and is a key focus at the World health organisation. A focus for the UK midwifery is current maternity services transformation, yet much of the global focus is on the importance of transformation in line with the recent Lancet series on maternity, and international collaboration to achieve the goals for Sustainable development. As a force, the team behind normal birth research serve this area powerfully, in informing care for women, babies and families across the global arena. The final rousing talk by Australian professor Hannah Dahlen, to the current backlash to ‘normal birth’ in the media was inspiring and is an editorial in the international journal Women and Birth. Next year the conference is in Michigan, USA!

Congratulations to Dr. Jane Fry & colleagues

Congratulations to Jane Fry, Janet Scammell and Sue Barker  in the Faculty of Health & Social Science on the publication of their latest paper ‘ Drowning in Muddied Waters or Swimming Downstream?: A Critical Analysis of Literature Reviewing in a Phenomenological Study through an Exploration of the Lifeworld, Reflexivity and Role of the Researcher’.

This innivative paper proceeds from examining the debate regarding the question of whether a systematic literature review should be undertaken within a qualitative research study to focusing specifically on the role of a literature review in a phenomenological study. Along with pointing to the pertinence of orienting to, articulating and delineating the phenomenon within a review of the literature, the paper presents an appropriate approach for this purpose. How a review of the existing literature should locate the focal phenomenon within a given context is illustrated by excerpts from the literature review within a descriptive phenomenological study. This article was recently published in the Indo-Pacific Journal of Phenomenology.  Click here for freely available copy online.

 

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

Congratulations to Dr. Keen on new Nepal publication

Congratulations to Dr. Steve Keen in the Faculty of Health & Social Sciences and BU PhD graduate Dr. Pratik Adhikary on the acceptance today of their paper ‘Risky work: Accidents among Nepalese migrant workers in Malaysia, Qatar and Saudi ‘ by the journal Health Prospect [1].  This is a peer-reviewed public health journal, part of Nepal Journals Online, and the journal is Open Access.  Nepal Journals OnLine (NepJOL) provides access to Nepalese published research, and increase worldwide knowledge of indigenous scholarship.

The Faculty of Health & Social Sciences has a growing number of publications on health and migration research, especially on the health and well-being of migrants from Nepal [2-5].

 

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

 

References:

  1. Adhikary, P., Sheppard, Z., Keen, S., van Teijlingen, E. (2017) Risky work: Accidents among Nepalese migrant workers in Malaysia, Qatar and Saudi, Health Prospect (forthcoming)
  2. Adhikary, P., Simkhada, P.P., van Teijlingen E., Raja, AE. (2008) Health & Lifestyle of Nepalese Migrants in the UK BMC International Health & Human Rights 8(6). Web address: www.biomedcentral.com/1472-698X/8/6.
  3. van Teijlingen E, Simkhada, P., Adhikary, P. (2009) Alcohol use among the Nepalese in the UK BMJ Rapid Response: www.bmj.com/cgi/eletters/339/oct20_1/b4028#223451
  4. Adhikary P., Keen S., van Teijlingen, E. (2011) Health Issues among Nepalese migrant workers in Middle East. Health Science Journal 5: 169-175. www.hsj.gr/volume5/issue3/532.pdf
  5. Aryal, N., Regmi, P.R., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Adhikary, P., Bhatta, Y.K.D., Mann, S. (2016) Injury and Mortality in Young Nepalese Migrant Workers: A Call for Public Health Action. Asian-Pacific Journal of Public Health 28(8): 703-705.

Denyse King’s Health Education England project ‘NoObesity’

NoObesity

The government’s key priority of reducing childhood obesity through adult education (as announced by Jeremy Hunt in Sept 2015), prompted BU’s Denyse King to write a proposal to Health Education England. Denyse is a Midwifery Lecturer / Public Health Practitioner in the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH) at Bournemouth University. The proposal outlined her wish to develop a stand-alone mobile learning resource for health workers who care for families of overweight or obese children, and for families who need to identify individual needs to facilitate behavioural changes.

Afbeeldingsresultaat voor childhood obesity statistics uk, 2016

The development of this project pivoted on putting patients and the public in the centre of the process. Patients and the public were engaged through focus groups where insights were gathered to identify the challenges and issues to the problem. A series of online focus groups were undertaken with service users and professionals to understand the key challenges and issues respondents came across when trying to prevent/manage overweight and obesity. Key themes from the focus groups were:

  • Empowering – the solution needs to recognise the experiences people bring and therefore the tools need to be empowering in supporting families to address obesity.
  • Parenting tips – to address challenges with encouraging positive health behaviours with children.
  • Responding to barriers – from parent/carers who are being supported by health professionals.
  • Obesity isn’t a quick fix – recognising that sustained behaviour change takes time and support to overcoming barriers is vital.
  • Healthy snacks and activities – provide easy and simple ideas to support parents/carers and professionals to identify quick ways to support healthier eating and increase activity.
  • Portion size – understanding that portion size is important in addition to eating healthily.

Topic experts were identified and invited to join the project steering group where they provided the governance and steer of the overall development of this project whilst Denyse King wrote the content. The following Apps have been developed as a result and will be available to all as free download in IOS and Android platforms from late September 2017:

  • NoObesity Family Focused App – After consultation with a healthcare worker, families set health goals, identify potential barriers and strategies to overcome them, record their progress towards their goals, earning points and awards as they go. Families are encouraged to link accounts to healthcare professional accounts (see below). The tool also includes parenting tips, games and useful links.
  • NoObesity Professional Focused App– Healthcare professionals can see the goals, barriers, strategies, progress, points and awards of linked families, making them better able to provide tailored advice to the families, to help them achieve their goals. This is based on research findings that ‘one-size- fits-all’ health advice simply doesn’t work for most families. The tool also includes the Wessex MECC-based guidance on how to best support families, how to handle common objections, games and useful links.

Denyse would like to thank Dr. Joanne Newton project proposal support, Felicity Hargreaves and Helen Bingham for approval of the final project proposall. Thanks to all those who contributed to answering the research questions, as well as those who tested and fed back on the prototype, and also to Bournemouth University, University of Southampton, and NHS England for their support of this project.

 

List of the members of the steering group

Name Job Title Organisation Steering Group Role
Em Rahman Head of Public Health Workforce Development Programmes Health Education England (Wessex) Steering Group Chair
Alison Potter Technology Enhanced Learning Lead (South) Health Education England (South) Deputy-Chair
Dr. Jenny Godson (MBE) National Lead for Oral Health Improvement Public Health England Dental and dental aspects of nutrition
Prof. Edwin van Teijingen Professor – Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health Bournemouth University Research supervision and education governance
Dr. Juliet McGrattan General Practitioner Cumbria Medical Chambers GP role governance
Kate King-Hicks Health and Wellbeing Programme Lead Public Health England (South East) Obesity governance
Tony Hewett Intervention Manager and behaviour change specialist Miltoncross Academy School staff role governance
Dr. Jo Walker Consultant Paediatrician Portsmouth Hospitals Trust Consultant doctors role governance
Dr. Wendy Marsh Lead Midwife for Safeguarding Portsmouth Hospitals Trust Safeguarding governance
Kate Lees Consultant in Public Health and Dietitian Lees & Latouze Nutrition governance
Denyse King Lecturer in Midwifery and Public Health Practitioner Bournemouth University Content author and governance

Good month for BU reproductive health publications

This month has been exceptionally good for BU publications in the field of midwifery and maternity care.  Two PhD students has their articles published in international academic journals, one member of staff had a textbook chapter published, an interdisciplinary team has been accepted for publication in the British Journal of Midwifery, and a member of the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH) co-authored this month’s editorial in the Journal of Asian Midwives  as well as an epidemiology paper on the HPV (Human Papilloma Virus) in Nepal.  

The first of this success story was CMMP PhD student Preeti Mahato whose  her latest paper ‘Factors related to choice of place of birth in a district in Nepal’ appeared in the Elsevier journal Sexual & Reproductive Healthcare  [1].  The second PhD paper was also based on research in Nepal this time by Sheetal Sharma whose paper ‘Evaluation a Community Maternal Health Programme: Lessons Learnt’ appeared in Journal of Asian Midwives [2].  The textbook chapter was by Dr. Jenny Hall who contributed a chapter to the latest edition of Mayes Midwifery , which is the classic midwifery textbook and now in its 15th edition [3].  The interdisciplinary paper is by Angela Warren, service user and carer coordinator PIER partnership, Dr Mel Hughes, principal academic in social work, academic lead for PIER partnership, and  Dr Jane Fry and Dr Luisa Cescutti-Butler who are both senior lecturers in midwifery in the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH) [4]. The latest issue of the Nepal Journal of Epidemiology carried a CMMPH co-authored paper on the HPV in young women in Nepal [5].   The final piece, an editorial, appeared yesterday in the latest issue of the Journal of Asian Midwives [6].


Congratulations to all authors!

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

 

References:

  1. Mahato, P., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Sheppard, Z., Silwal, R.C. (2017)  Factors related to choice of place of birth in a district in Nepal, Sexual & Reproductive Healthcare 13 : 91-96.
  2. Sharma, S., Simkhada, P., Hundley, V., van Teijlingen, E., Stephens, J., Silwal, R.C., Angell, C. (2017) Evaluation a Community Maternal Health Programme: Lessons Learnt. Journal of Asian Midwives. 4 (1): 3–20.
  3. Hall, J. (2017) ‘Fertility and it’s control’ In: Macdonald, S. & Johnson, G.  Mayes’ Midwifery, 15th Edition,  London: Elsevier.
  4. Warren, A., Hughes, M., Fry, J., Cescutti-Butler, L. (2017) ‘Involvement in midwifery education: experiences from a university service user and carer partnership’ British Journal of Midwifery (forthcoming).
  5. Sathian, B., Babu, MGR., van Teijlingen, E.R., Banerjee, I., Subramanya, H.S., Roy, B., Subramanya, H., Rajesh, E., Devkota, S. (2017) Ethnic variation in perception of Human Papillomavirus and its Vaccination among young women in Nepal, Nepal Journal of Epidemiology 7 (1): 647-658.  http://www.nepjol.info/index.php/NJE/article/view/17757
  6. Jan, R., van Teijlingen, E. (2017) Exciting Times in South-Asian Midwifery, Journal of Asian Midwives 4 (1):1

New publication Sheetal Sharma (PhD graduate 2017)

Congratulations to Sheetal Sharma whose latest article appeared in today’s new issue of Journal of Asian Midwives [1]. Sheetal wrote the paper ‘Evaluation a Community Maternal Health Programme: Lessons Learnt’ with her PhD supervisors Dr. Catherine Angell, Prof. Vanora Hundley, Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen and Prof. Padam Simkhada (Liverpool John Moores University & FHSS Visiting Professor) and the director of Green Tara Nepal Mr. Ram Chandra Silwal and the founder of Green Tara Trust, London, Dr. Jane Stephens. The Journal of Asian Midwives is an Open-Access journal hence this article is freely available across the globe.

(c) Sheetal Sharma

Focus groups in open air in rural Nepal, (c) Sheetal Sharma

 

Reference:

Sharma, S., Simkhada, P., Hundley, V., van Teijlingen, E., Stephens, J., Silwal, R.C., Angell, C. (2017) Evaluation a Community Maternal Health Programme: Lessons Learnt. Journal of Asian Midwives. 4(1): 3–20.

New maternity research paper on Nepal

Congratulations to Preeti Mahato, PhD student in the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health, on the publication of her latest paper ‘Factors related to choice of place of birth in a district in Nepal’ in the Elsevier journal Sexual & Reproductive Healthcare  [1].  The paper based on her research work in Nawalparasi, southern Nepal.  This new paper is the third paper form Preeti’s PhD work [2-3].

 

Reference:

  1. Mahato, P., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Sheppard, Z., Silwal, R.C. (2017)  Factors related to choice of place of birth in a district in Nepal, Sexual & Reproductive Healthcare 13 : 91-96.
  2. Mahato, P., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Angell, C. (2016) Birthing centres in Nepal: Recent developments, obstacles and opportunities, Journal of Asian Midwives 3(1): 18-30. http://ecommons.aku.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1033&context=jam
  3. Mahato, P.K., Regmi, P.R., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Angell, C., Sathian, B. (2015) Birthing centre infrastructure in Nepal post 2015 earthquake. Nepal Journal of Epidemiology 5(4): 518-519. http://www.nepjol.info/index.php/NJE/article/view/14260/11579

New publication on Community Hospitals

The Health Services Journal published a commentary this week on Community Hospitals [1].  This online article is written by Dr. Emma Pitchforth who is based at RAND Europe in Cambridge (& BU Visiting Faculty), Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen (Faculty of Health & Social Sciences) and Dr. Ellen Nolte based at the European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies

The authors highlight the recently completed NIHR study on Community Hospitals [2].  The notion of a Community Hospital in the UK is evolving from the traditional model of a local hospital staffed by general practitioners and nurses and serving mainly rural populations. Along with the diversification of models, there is a renewed policy interest in community hospitals and their potential to deliver integrated care. However, there is a need to better understand the role of different models of community hospitals within the wider health economy and an opportunity to learn from experiences of other countries to inform this potential.

With ease of access and a sense of homeliness, there is potential for Community Hospitals to be better integrated into NHS in England.  The authors suggest that a more strategic role for ‘traditional’ Community Hospitals might be timely within the NHS in England.  They further conclude that if challenges around Community Hospitals are addressed and their within the English health system is properly defined, they could provide positive benefits to the health service. It seems that, if done correctly, Community Hospitals could be a traditional solution to help address some of the modern day challenges of the NHS.The full NIHR report is Open Access and can be found here!

Last year the research team had already published a scoping review article from the NIHR study [3].

 

 

References:

  1. Pitchforth, E., van Teijlingen, E., Nolte, E. (2017) Community hospitals: a traditional solution to help today’s NHS? Health Services Journal (11 July) https://www.hsj.co.uk/community-services/community-hospitals-a-traditional-solution-to-help-todays-nhs/7020019.article#/scientific-summary
  2. Pitchforth, E., Nolte, E., Corbett, J., Miani., C, Winpenny., E, van Teijlingen, E., Elmore, N,, King, S,, Ball, S,, Miler, J,, Ling, T. (2017) Community hospitals and their services in the NHS: identifying transferable learning from international developments – scoping review, systematic review, country reports and case studies Health Services & Delivery Research 5(19): 1-248.
  3. Wimpenny, E.M., Corbett, J., Miami, C., King, S., Pitchforth, E., Ling, T., van Teijlingen, E. Nolte, E. (2016) Community hospitals in selected high income countries: a scoping review of approaches and models. International Journal of Integrated Care 16(4): 13 http://dx.doi.org/10.5334/ijic.2463

 

Tenth anniversary PLOS ONE

On the tenth anniversary of the international Open Access journal PLOS ONE we received an email to inform us that one of our articles was among the top ten per cent of most cited articles in this journal.  The email referred to our paper ‘Factors influencing adherence to antiretroviral treatment in Nepal: A mixed-methods study’ [1].  Not bad considering that PLOS ONE has published over 4,300 articles since its inception.


Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

New paper Dr. Jenny Hall

Congratulations to Dr. Jenny Hall in the Faculty of Health & Social Sciences (FHSS) on her new published discussion paper ‘Educating student midwives around dignity and respect’ in the international journal Women and Birth (published by Elsevier).  The paper, co-authored with Mary Mitchell (University of the West of England), discusses the issue that there is currently limited information available on how midwifery students learn to provide care that promotes dignity and respect.

 

Well done!

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health

 

Reference:

  1. Hall, J., Mitchell, M. (2017) ‘Educating student midwives around dignity and respect’, Women & Birth 30(3): 214-219.

 

BU’s PGR Isabell Nessel at the Department of Life Sciences, University of Roehampton

 I had the pleasure of spending the last three weeks in the Department of Life Sciences (University of Roehampton), working with Dr Giulia Corona and Dr Volker Behrends. We successfully validated an ultra-high performance liquid chromatography coupled with triple quadrupole mass spectrometry (UPLC-MS/MS) method to analyse lipid peroxidation products (breakdown products of fats) in human urine samples.

Our ultimate goal is to identify the time-course of oxidative stress and subsequent breakdown of lipids in neonates, by analysing urinary lipid peroxides, to facilitate evidence-based approaches to antioxidant support in preterm neonates. My supervisors Dr Simon Dyall and Prof Minesh Khashu and I are currently developing a pilot study in cooperation with Poole Hospital NHS Foundation Trust to test the feasibility of measuring these products in urine samples from preterm neonates. However, before moving on to preterm samples, the method had to be tested and validated, using adult urine samples.

The project was made possible by an HSS Seed Corn fund obtained by Dr Simon Dyall, the PGR fund of Isabell Nessel, the collaboration with Dr Giulia Corona and Dr Volker Behrends at the Department of Life Sciences (University of Roehampton) and collaboration with Dr Thierry Durand and his group from the Institute des Biomolecules Max Mousseroux, (Montpellier, France) who generously provided the standards used in this analysis. I am grateful that I had this opportunity to further develop my research skills and to learn a new state-of-the-art technique and would like to thank all involved for making this possible!

If you would like to learn more about our research please feel free to contact me at inessel@bournemouth.ac.uk

Isabell

“Is it 2 breastfeeds and then a bottle, or is it one breastfeed and a bottle? Not sure”?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Last week Senior Midwifery lecturer Dr Luisa Cescutti-Butler, member of CMMPH, had the opportunity to attend and present at the prestigious international 3 day conference organised by MAINN @ UCLAN. Nutrition and Nurture in Infancy and Childhood: Bio-Cultural Perspectives. It took place in the beautiful surrounds of Grange-Over-Sands in Cumbria. It was attended by speakers and researchers from India, Australia, Sweden, South Africa, USA, Canada as well as the UK and therefore an ideal networking opportunity. The title of Luisa’s presentation was “Is it 2 breastfeeds and then a bottle, or is it one breastfeed and a bottle? Not sure”?, based on her PhD study, supervised by Professor Ann Hemingway, Dr. Jaqui Hewitt-Taylor. The paper reported on women’s experiences of feeding their late preterm baby/babies (LPBs), born between 340/7 and 36 6/7 weeks gestation, especially pertinent as the rates for these births is rising. A feminist approach to the study had been utilised using in depth two phase qualitative interviews.

Luisa says of the conference: ‘ I got to meet researchers that I have used widely within my PhD such as Renee Flacking from Sweden who has undertaken research around preterm babies, Virginia Schmied internationally renowned midwifery professor and Professor Paula Meier who has extensively researched late preterm babies and breastfeeding. She came and listened to my presentation and enjoyed it. Thought my findings were very interesting but was a little dismayed that practice had not moved forward. It was also a good opportunity to meet up with twitter buddies such as Laura Godfrey-Isaacs @godfrey_issacs, who took the photos!’

Luisa may be contacted further about her study but the findings indicate that women caring for LPBs frequently encountered contradictory advice regarding infant feeding and often felt their own experiences, intuition and instincts were devalued. The research concludes that the practice of feeding of LPBs should be revisited in partnership with women, so their experiences and perspectives can be utilised to develop satisfying nurturing relationships whilst also meeting nutritional requirements and that breastfeeding is a feminist, human rights issue. The full abstract is published in the conference proceedings.