Enhancing the understanding and delivery of preconception care

Abstract

Background:

Good preconception health, which involves planning and preparing for pregnancy, reduces the incidence of preventable morbidity and mortality for women, their babies and future generations. Preconception care aims to assess and modify biomedical, behavioural and social risk factors before pregnancy. Barriers to the delivery and uptake of preconception care have been identified across the socio-ecological spectrum at the individual, organisational and societal levels. Addressing these barriers presents opportunities to enhance the understanding and delivery of preconception care.

Methods:

In this PhD thesis nine barriers to the delivery of preconception care across the socio-ecological spectrum were identified and explored using different research methodologies including a systematic review, quantitative and qualitive studies.

Specifically, this work has explored consumer and clinician barriers at the individual level, workforce and resource barriers at the organisational level and a lack of health promotion measures and monitoring processes at the societal level. This approach allowed a comprehensive understanding of how these barriers are connected and how solutions to one barrier can influence another.

Results:

The series of projects in this PhD thesis present a detailed analysis of nine barriers to the delivery of preconception care. Eight original and important public health findings have been presented that can improve the understanding and delivery of preconception care and as such to improve the health of people in Australia.

The findings call for a structured, multi-strategy approach that addresses barriers to the delivery of preconception care across the socioecological spectrum. Such an approach requires significant change to the current public health practice and service delivery of preconception care.