Abstract
Background: Considerable changes in maternity care provision internationally were implemented in response to COVID-19. Such changes, often occurring suddenly with little advance warning, have had the potential to affect women's and maternity care providers experience of maternity care, both positively and negatively. For this reason, to gain insight and understanding of personal and professional experiences, we will perform a synthesis of the available qualitative evidence on women and maternity care providers' views and experiences of maternity care during COVID-19. Methods and analysis: A qualitative evidence synthesis will be conducted. Studies will be eligible if they include pregnant or postpartum women (up to six months) and maternity care providers who received or provided care during COVID-19. To retrieve relevant literature the electronic databases of CINAHL, EMBASE, MEDLINE, PsycINFO, and the Cochrane COVID study register ( https://covid-19.cochrane.org/) will be searched from 01-Jan-2020 to date of search. A combination of search terms based on COVID-19, pregnancy, childbirth and maternity care, and study design, will be used to guide the search. The methodological quality of the included studies will be assessed by at least two reviewers using the Evidence for Policy and Practice Information (EPPI)-Centre 12-criteria quality assessment tool. The Thomas and Harden approach to thematic synthesis will be used for data synthesis. This will involve line by line coding of extracted data, establishing descriptive themes, and determining analytical themes. Confidence in the findings of the review will be assessed by two reviewers independently using Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation-Confidence in the Evidence from Reviews of Qualitative research (GRADE-CERQual). Conclusion: The proposed synthesis of evidence will help identify maternity care needs during a global pandemic from the perspectives of those receiving and providing care. The evidence will inform and help enhance care provision into the future.
Highlights
This article is included in the Coronavirus (COVID-19) collection
As of 20 January 2021, approx. 1-year since the emergence of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), the disease caused by the strain of coronavirus, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), almost 97 million people have become infected globally and over two million people have died from the disease[1]
The risk of contracting COVID-19 does not appear heightened by pregnancy, nor are pregnant women more likely to die from the disease; there is some evidence to suggest that morbidity may be higher with COVID-19 in pregnancy[3,4]
Summary
Pauline Dawson , University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand. Any reports and responses or comments on the article can be found at the end of the article. Conclusion: The proposed synthesis of evidence will help identify maternity care needs during a global pandemic from the perspectives of those receiving and providing care. The evidence will inform and help enhance care provision into the future. Keywords COVID-19, maternity care, pregnancy and childbirth, systematic review, thematic synthesis, qualitative evidence synthesis. This article is included in the Coronavirus (COVID-19) collection
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