Women's evaluations of their experience with fetal intrapartum oxygen saturation monitoring and participation in a research project

Abstract

Objective: to evaluate women's perceptions of their participation in a research project in labour and their experience with fetal oxygen saturation monitoring. Design: survey using a questionnaire of women's ratings of ten aspects of their experience with the project. Setting: Royal Women's Hospital, Brisbane, Australia. Participants: women who had participated in clinical observational studies of fetal intrapartum oxygen saturation monitoring. Findings: 78 questionnaires were distributed and 77 returned. Overall, women evaluated their participation in this research project favourably, in terms of both their involvement in the research study and the use of fetal oxygen saturation monitoring. Several women commented that they appreciated the additional support they received from the research midwife. Key conclusions: responses indicated that the women surveyed appreciated the opportunity to participate in research, were not averse to this new technology, and benefited from the perceived additional human contact and support they received. The high response rate to the questionnaire indicates that childbearing women are willing to be included in assessing the appropriateness of new birth technologies that may affect the well-being of women and babies in the future.