Facilitators and Barriers to Access to Midwife-Led Birth Settings for Racialized Women in the UK: A Scoping Review.

Background: In UK maternity care, racialized women have worse experiences and clinical outcomes than White women. Midwife-led birth settings (MLBS), including home births and midwife-led units, both freestanding and alongside hospitals, are all available as choices for low-risk women in the UK. MLBS deliver optimal outcomes for low-risk women with uncomplicated pregnancies, including for racialized women, and can offer culturally specific care, possibly mitigating existing social inequalities.

Development and Validation of the Midwifery Interventions Classification for a Salutogenic Approach to Maternity Care: A Delphi Study.

This study aims to develop and validate a Midwifery Interventions Classification (MIC), which is an evidence-based, standardized taxonomy and classification of core midwifery interventions based on a salutogenic perspective for maternity care. This study described the consensus process up to the results regarding the validation of the MIC through a two-round Delphi survey involving three panels of stakeholders: Midwives, Healthcare Researchers, and Maternity Service Users. The resulting MIC comprises 135 core midwifery interventions classified into Direct Midwifery care (n = 80 interventions), Indirect Midwifery Care (n = 43 interventions), and Community Midwifery Care (n = 12 interventions), reaching an overall consensus rate among experts equal to 87%.

Developmental Strategy and Validation of the Midwifery Interventions Classification (MIC): A Delphi Study Protocol and Results from the Developmental Phase.

This study protocol aims to describe the rationale and developmental strategy of the first study in the Italian context which aimed to define a Midwifery Interventions Classification, an evidence-based, standardized taxonomy and classification of midwifery interventions. Midwifery interventions require a specific definition, developed through a consensus-building process by stakeholders to develop the Italian taxonomy of the Midwifery Interventions Classification with the potential for international transferability, implementation, and scaling up. A multi-round Delphi study was designed between June and September 2022, and data collection is planned between February 2023 and February 2024.

The Italian midwifery core outcome set (M-COS) for healthy childbearing women and newborns: Development and initial validation study.

Objective: This study aimed to develop and validate a midwifery core outcome set (M-COS) for Italian settings based on a salutogenic framework of maternity care.

Design: A multi-phase and multi-method study was performed. In phase one, we conducted a literature review to identify a preliminary set of outcomes sensitive to midwifery care.

Male partner participation in maternity care and social support for childbearing women: a discussion paper.

Male partners/fathers are key support persons for many childbearing women and their involvement in pregnancy, childbirth and the postpartum/postnatal period has beneficial effects on a wide range of outcomes related to maternal and child health and family wellbeing. Social support is implicated in the relevant causal pathway, but has received largely tangential attention in the public health literature. This discussion paper aims to reframe men's participation in maternity care as an opportunity to enhance their readiness and ability to provide social support to women, contributing to the debate on the definition and rationale for male partner involvement, and paving the way for further empirical work.