Women's Satisfaction With Obstetric Triage Services.

Objective: To determine the satisfaction of pregnant women who presented at a triage unit in an obstetric birthing care unit with obstetric triage services.

Design: Qualitative descriptive with conventional content analysis.

Setting: Individual audio recorded telephone interviews with women after discharge from a tertiary care hospital's obstetric triage unit.

Participants: Purposive sample of 19 pregnant women who had received obstetric triage services.

Methods: A semi-structured interview guide was used for data collection. All interviews were audio-taped and transcribed verbatim. Data analysis was consistent with qualitative content analysis with open coding to categorize and develop themes to describe women's satisfaction with triage services and care.

Results: Five themes, Triage Unit Environment, Triage Staff Attitude and Behavior, Triage Team Function, Nursing Care Received in Triage and Time Spent in Triage, illustrated the women's recent triage experiences. Overall the women were very satisfied with the triage services. Women appreciated a caring approach from triage nurses, being informed about the well-being of themselves and their fetuses, being closely monitored, and effective teamwork among the members of the health care team.

Conclusions: The results indicated that a humanizing, caring approach by the inter-professional team offering obstetric triage services contributed to women's satisfaction and woman-centered care.