Tagged / CMWH

CMWH well represented at International Labour and Birth Conference

The Centre for Midwifery and Women’s Health was well represented at last week’s International Labour and Birth Conference with presentations from Sara Stride, Dominique Mylod, and Vanora Hundley.

Sara StrideSara was presenting her doctoral work where she has used appreciative inquiry to explore midwives’ experience and processing following the occurrence of Obstetric Anal Sphincter injury (OASI) during spontaneous vaginal birth. Sara said that she found the conference and networking opportunities “inspiring and helpful for her PhD.”

Dominique and Vanora brought their prototype app, which has been designed to support women in the early phase of labour. This was well received by attendees and the next step is to evaluate its implementation into practice.Dom and Vanora

Dominique’s attendance at ILB Conference 2025 was supported by an award from the Science of Birth Research Cluster, University of British Columbia.

Megan Perkin’s work exploring breastfeeding experiences of women with visual impairment was presented as a poster. Unfortunately Megan was not able  to attend due to her clinical commitments, but Vanora was on hand to answer any questions.

 

BU paper among top 20 most cited papers

BRIAN, PG research, writing

The international journal Sociological Research Online ranked a paper written by Bournemouth University academics in its top twenty most cited papers in the past three years.  The methodological paper ‘Using a range of communication tools to interview a hard-to-reach population’ has as lead author Dr. Orlanda Harvey in the Faculty of Health, Environment & Medical Science.

Reference:

  1. Harvey, O., van Teijlingen, E., Parrish, M. (2024) Using a range of communication tools to interview a hard-to-reach population, Sociological Research Online 29(1): 221–232 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/13607804221142212

New Centre for Midwifery & Women’s Health (CMHW) paper on Nepal

international, open access, Publishing, writing

Last week the international Journal of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene for Development emailed to tell that our paper ‘Exploring handwashing knowledge and practice among lactating mothers in Kathmandu’s slum communities’ [1] had been accepted for publication.

It is widely known that poor access to good quality water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) lead to high morbidity in young children. The paper reports on a cross-sectional study conducted with 127 breastfeeding mothers in two slum settlements in Nepal’s capital.  It found that most had a good knowledge of WASH and appropriate washing of hands. However, the prevalence of illness among children whose mothers had only basic education was 26% higher than those whose mothers had completed secondary education. Family income and hand-washing practice were also significantly associated with child health (p < 0.01). Nearly three in four (73.2%) of children had experienced health issues, particularly diarrhoea, in the past half year.

The authors concluded that strengthening maternal hand-hygiene education programmes, particularly for lactating mothers, and improving WASH infrastructure are necessary, as well as promoting affordable hand-washing solutions in urban slums.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

 

Reference:

  1. Devkota, G.P., Sharma, M.K., Sherpa, S., Khanal, T.R., Devkota, B., van Teijlingen, E. (2025) Exploring handwashing knowledge and practice among lactating mothers in Kathmandu’s slum communities, Nepal, Journal of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene for Development, 15:1-10. doi: 10.2166/washdev.2025.084

New BU midwifery publication

NHS, open access, Publishing, Women's Academic Network, writing

Congratulations to Laura Stedman in the Centre for Midwifery & Women’s Health (CMWH) on the publication of a new paper in the international academic journal Midwifery.  This new paper ‘Then they’re not there. Women’s experiences following admission of their newborn to a neonatal intensive care unit‘ [1], has been co-authored with two fellow midwives: Associate Prof. Catherine Angell and Prof. Vanora Hundley.

The paper reports an online study into the experiences of UK women been diagnosed with Gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) whose baby was admitted to a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at or shortly after birth. The qualitative analysis identified two themes: ‘experience’ and ‘understanding’; the former had five sun-themes and the latter was based on three sub-themes. A lack of understanding and knowledge was identified, with calls for enhanced education and joint decision making. Women recalled feelings of grief, isolation and stress as a result of the admission. For many, this experience was traumatic with lasting effects. For babies born at term, feelings of surprise and separation were paramount, in contrast to those born pre-term.  The authors concluded that there is need for more education and improved material to support for those facing this outcome. Future research should also focus on reducing the incidence of admission to NICU for women who have received a diagnosis of GDM.

Well done!
Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen
Reference:
  1. Stedman, L., Angell, C., Hundley, V. (2025) Then they’re not there. Women’s experiences following admission of their newborn to a neonatal intensive care unit, Midwifery [online first]

BU’s Dr. Iannuzzi editing special issue HEALTHCARE

international, Publishing, Women's Academic Network, writing

Dr. Laura Iannuzzi, based in the Centre for Midwifery & Women’s Health, is acting as one of the two guest editors of a Special Issue for the international journal Healthcare.  This Special Issue called ‘Advancing Midwifery and Nursing Practice: Equity, Inclusion and Integrated Care’ currently has a call out for contributions. Details can be found by clicking here!

Healthcare is looking for authors to submit papers exploring strategic directions for midwifery and nursing in advancing inclusion, equity, and health.  This Special Issue is open to topics such as integrated care strategies and long-term care models, professional nursing roles, evidence-based interventions, and community-engaged approaches. The proposed theme aligns with Healthcare’s focus on multidisciplinary research and practical solutions that improve health outcomes across populations.

In this Special Issue, original research articles and reviews are welcome. Research areas may include (but are not limited to) the following:

  • Strategic frameworks and global policy implications for midwifery and nursing;
  • Educational innovations to promote equity and development;
  • Evidence-based clinical practices focused on underserved populations;
  • Community health initiatives and participatory care models;
  • Coordinated interprofessional models and organizational frameworks that promote inclusive and equitable care;
  • Impacts of global crises (e.g., pandemics, conflict) on midwifery and nursing practices.

The Guest Editors are Dr. Simona Fumagalli and Dr. Laura Iannuzzi

World War II: Eating tulip bulbs

international, writing

Tulip bulbs can be eaten, but it is not a common source of human food. Eating tulip bulbs helped many Dutch people in the Hunger Winter, the last winter of the Second World War (1944-1945). During the German occupation the Dutch suffered from a shortage of food.  In the collection of my mother, I found a short book published in 1941 with a made-do-and-mend approach about growing your own food.  My mother died this summer at the age of 92.

The book ‘Veel groenten van weinig grond’ (in Dutch: Many vegetables from little soil) gives advice to readers on how to grown vegetables in small plots of land, gardens, etc.  This book in the first year of the occupation does not mention the use of tulips as food. Hidden in the book was a typed one-page sheet with three instruction for tulips followed by five recipes.

The main message seems to be that the preparation of the tulip bulbs as well as the taste is very much like potatoes.  For example, the recipe for tulip bulb puree includes boiling the bulbs, one packet of vanilla sugar or vanilla essence, three spoons of honey, artificial honey or syrup, mix well and add warm water.

 

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

Faculty of Health, Environment & Medical Sciences

Top baby names in England and Wales in 2024

Earlier this week the Office for National Statistics (ONS) published its annual list of the most popular baby names for boys and girls.  The top three names for girls were: Olivia, Amelia and Lily and for boys these were Muhammad, Noah and Oliver.  Interestingly two different spellings of Muhammad, namely Mohammed and Muhammed also made it to the top hundred most common names.  There is a clear sociology in the naming of babies.  First, there is an element of culture and religion, but there is also a clear element of fashion.

To make a simple comparison I looked at the top three most common names for girls and boys in neighbouring the Netherlands.  According to Dutch official statistics the top girls’ names were in 2024: Emma, Olivia and Lily, and the top three boys names were: Noah, Luca and Lucas. Interestingly, the top name in England and Wales Muhammad is not even in the top 40 most popular boys’ names in the Netherlands, and neither are Mohammed and Muhammed.  However, whereas England and Wales listed three different spellings of Muhammad, the Netherlands had six different ones (these were names used at least ten times that year): Muhammad, Mohammed, Mohamed, Mohamad, Muhammed, and Muhammad.  All variants together made it the fourth most popular boys name in the Netherlands.

Charles Dickens | Mystery of Edwin Drood | 9780140439267 | Daunt Books

To highlight the fashion element of naming babies, the name Edwin was not listed on either country’s list.  The ONS website also offers historic lists of top 100 names for baby boys and girls for 1904 to 2024 at ten-yearly intervals.  The very last year Edwin was in the top 100 boys’ names was in 1944 when it reached number 89 in the top 100!

 

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

Professor of Reproductive Health, Centre for Midwifery & Women’s Health

Second paper for CMWH MRes student

PG research

Congratulations to Maryam Malekian, a MRes student in CMWH, who has just published her second paper as part of her integrated thesis in the highly respected journal Midwifery. Maryam’s paper reports her recently completed scoping review looking at knowledge and attitudes of nulliparous women regarding breastfeeding.

Malekian M, Irving M, Hundley V (2025) Factors associated with breastfeeding knowledge and attitudes among non-pregnant, nulliparous women of reproductive age: A Scoping review. Midwifery, vol 148, September, 104511

The protocol was published earlier this year in MIDIRS Midwifery Digest. She has also presented this work at the Maternal, Parental and Infant Nutrition and Nurture Unit (MAINN) Conference in April.

Malekian M, Hundley V, Irving M. (2025) A scoping review protocol of factors influencing breastfeeding knowledge and attitudes among non-pregnant, nulliparous women of reproductive age. MIDIRS Midwifery Digest, vol 35, no 2, June, pp 179-182.

Digital Health and AI: Paving the Way for Health Equity in Maternal and Infant Care

The long awaited 10-year health plan for England emphasises the use of digital technologies and the aspiration to “make the NHS the most AI-enabled health system in the world”. This requires expertise in artificial intelligence and data science, but interdisciplinary collaboration is also essential if we are to make this a reality.

The Maternal and Infant Health Equity Research Centre (MIHERC) aims to do this by bringing together experts in maternal health, behavioural science, AI and digital health to help drive innovative solutions through co-production and real partnership, ensuring better outcomes for all women and babies. MIHERC is led by Professor Hora Soltani at Sheffield Hallam University (SHU) in collaboration with key partners including Bournemouth University (BU), the City of Doncaster Council and South Yorkshire Digital Health Hub.

Alongside Professor Vanora Hundley, who has been appointed as a Capacity Training and Development Lead, Professor Huseyin Dogan and Prof Alessandro Di Nuovo from MIHERC will be co-leading the cross-cutting workstream titled “digital, data, monitoring, evaluation and implementation science” as part of the NIHR Maternity Disparities consortium. This workstreams aims

– to identify and test trusted, reliable AI technologies for deployment by the NHS to help reduce disparities;

– to develop and refine equity monitoring, real-world evaluation and implementation science methods for use in maternity disparities research, with a focus on enhancing their robustness and practical application;

– to embed advanced analytic and digital tools and implementation frameworks into maternity disparities research to improve the rigor and impact of studies on equity; and

– to build a community of practice within and external to consortium to develop analytical, methodological, and implementation science capacity.

The BU key academics are: Huseyin Dogan, Vanora Hundley, Edwin van Teijlingen, and Deniz Çetinkaya. Please do get in touch with the MIHERC team for further information.

Academics write for newspaper in Nepal

innovation, international, open access, Publishing, writing

Yesterday the online newspaper Online Khabar in Nepal published an opinion piece in English written by three Bournemouth University academics working with a colleague in Kathmandu.  This interdisciplinary piece ‘Resilient through experiences: Unlocking the entrepreneurial prowess of Nepal’s left-behind women‘ brings together ideas gained from many different studies and disciplines.  The three authors from Bournemouth University are: Dr. Sukanya Ayatakshi-Endow, Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen, and Dr. Pramod Regmi, and they collaborated with Dr. Rashmee Rajkarnikar who is based at Nepal’s oldest and largest university, Tribhuvan University.  The four authors brings insights from economics, business studies, sociology, women’s studies, migration studies and health.

Paper accepted on women and disability in Nepal

international, open access, Women's Academic Network, writing

The academic editor of PLOS ONE informed us yesterday that our latest paper ‘Life-time experience of violence among women and girls living with disability in Nepal: A cross-sectional study’ [1] has been accepted for publication.  The paper is based on research conducted as part of the Inclusive Partnership Against Violence (INPAV) project in Nepal.  Working with our long-term research paper Green Tara Nepal (GTN) and funded by The United Nations Trust Fund (UNTF) through Nepal Disabled Women Association (NDWA), we have been involved in InPAV. This project included a situation analysis of the existing government setup One-stop Crisis Management Center (OCMC) to understand the inclusiveness of the OCMC services for girls and women with disabilities.  The paper just accepted was part of this research.

 

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

Centre for Midwifery & Women’s Health

 

  1. Simkhada, P., Basnet, S., Sharma, S., van Teijlingen, E., Wasti, S.P., Dahal, T., Okyere, J., Silwal, R.C., Pyakurel, M. (2025) Life-time experience of violence among women and girls living with disability in Nepal: A cross-sectional study . PLoS ONE (accepted).

Successful academic writing, publishing and collaboration workshop at BU

PG research, Publishing, Women's Academic Network, writing

Last week’s workshop on ‘Academic Writing, Publishing & Collaborating’ held at Talbot Campus organised by Mrs. Anjana Paudyal, Ph.D. student in FHSS (Faculty of Health & Social Sciences) was very engaging and very well attended.  This event was part of the Doctoral College’s Research Culture and Community workshop series.  The workshop was opened by Anjana, who spoke about publishing her first PhD paper in the first half year of her part-time PhD journey.

Key sessions in this interactive workshop included presentations from Ms. Jillian Ireland based at UHD (University Hospitals Dorset NHS Foundation Trust) and academics based at BU.  Jillian spoke about her experience of publishing in practice journals as well as publishing papers about practice in academic journals.

Whilst Dr. Pramod Regmi, Principal Academic in International Health in FHSS stressed the importance of paying attention to publishing metrics and identifiers, including h-factors, impact factors, and social media use in academic publishing.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen, Research Culture Champion in FHSS outlined ideas for turning PhD chapters in papers and he also highlighted BU’s unique option of doing a so-called ‘Integrated thesis‘.  The integrated thesis format allows students to incorporate papers into their thesis.  These can be published papers, papers accepted for publication, papers submitted, prepared but not submitted papers and other unpublished papers or reports.

Dr. Orlanda Harvey is a senior lecturer in Social Work at BU, specialising in Developing Professional Relationships and Leadership, she presented replying to reviewers.   The Question & Answer session was lively and engaging.

Last, but not least, Anjana Paudyal, the organiser, and presenters would like to thank the Doctoral College for supporting this important event!

Two new midwifery papers from CMWH

The latest issue of MIDIRS Midwifery Digest features two papers from CMWH members.

Laura SLaura Stedman reports on the global variance in screening approaches and diagnostic criteria for gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM). She explores the impact of these differences on policy recommendations and practice. Without a universally accepted screening criterion, the variance in approaches makes accurately calculating the prevalence of GDM difficult. Untreated GDM results in women being more likely to experience pre-eclampsia, caesarean birth or stillbirth, while babies are more likely to be born prematurely, macrosomic or large for gestational age.

Also in this issue, Maryam Malekian, a MRes student in CMWH, has had her scoping review protocol published. Maryam has recently completed the review looking at knowledge and attitudes of nulliparous women regarding breastfeeding. She presented this work at the Maternal, Parental and Infant Nutrition and Nurture Unit (MAINN) Conference in April and has submitted the findings for publication.

 

Congratulations to both authors.

References:

Stedman L, Angell C, Hundley VA. Gestational diabetes mellitus: evaluating the implications of applying international research into national policy and practice. MIDIRS Midwifery Digest, vol 35, no 2, June 2025, pp 141–147.

Malekian M, Hundley V, Irving M. A scoping review protocol of factors influencing breastfeeding knowledge and attitudes among non-pregnant, nulliparous women of reproductive age. MIDIRS Midwifery Digest, vol 35, no 2, June 2025, pp 179-182.

CMWH showcases research at Wessex Health Partnership event

On 19th May 2025 at the Wessex Women and Girls Event at the Southampton Science Park, BU’s Centre for Midwifery and Women’s Health  showcased its research and innovation in women’s health.

Professor Vanora Hundley and Dr. Dominique Mylod presented their ongoing development of an Early Labour app as a case study for the Maternity and Infant Health Equity Research Collaboration with Sheffield Hallam University. Professor Carol Clark’s presentation focussed on pelvic floor health and the cost of urinary and faecal incontinence to women’s health and the planet. Dr. Chloe Casey honoured her mother-in-law’s memory with her PechaKucha presentation on using creative methodologies to engage women in recovery from alcohol.

In addition, Dr. Malika Felton and MRes students Susara Blunden and Maryam Malekian displayed posters summarising their research into the impact of exercise on women’s physiology and health, improving diagnositic and treatment pathways for women with endometriosis and exploring the impact of professional knowledge and skills on breastfeeding support respectively.

The event provided a valuable platform for BU researchers to connect with regional partners, contribute to the growing Wessex Women and Girls research network, and play a key role in shaping future initiatives aimed at closing gaps in women’s health. The CMWH’s invovement reinforces BU’s role as a leading voice in this important area of health innovation.