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Women’s health and midwifery
Non-pharmacological interventions may reduce levels of fear of childbirth, but the reduction may not be clinically significant
  1. Zeinab Hamzehgardeshi1,
  2. Fatemeh Ansari2
  1. 1 Sexual and Reproductive Health Research Center, Department of Reproductive Health and Midwifery, Faculty of Nursing and Midwifery, Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences, Sari, Mazandaran, Iran
  2. 2 Faculty of Nursing and Midwifery, Student Research Committee, Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences, Sari, Iran
  1. Correspondence to Dr Zeinab Hamzehgardeshi, Sexual and Reproductive Health Research Center, Department of Reproductive Health and Midwifery, Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences Faculty of Nursing and Midwifery, Sari, Mazandaran, Iran; z.hamzehgardeshi{at}mazums.ac.ir

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Commentary on: O'Connell MA, Khashan AS, Leahy-Warren P, Stewart F, O'Neill SM. Interventions for fear of childbirth including tocophobia. Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2021(7). doi:10.1002/14651858.CD013321.pub2.

Implications for practice and research

  • Healthcare providers such as gynaecologists, obstetricians and midwives as well as mental healthcare providers can reduce high-level or intense fears of childbirth in women and strengthen their sense of self-efficacy in the face of delivery, something that could result in a reduction of elective caesarean section.

  • However, in high-quality randomised clinical studies, the effectiveness of non-pharmacological interventions on other important outcomes such as maternal satisfaction and women’s anxiety should also be examined.

Context

Pregnancy is a special situation in which there is a natural fear of the process of childbirth. However, the amount of fear is significantly related to the personality and knowledge of the parents in this regard. Numerous clinical studies have investigated the effectiveness of non-pharmacological interventions in minimising the fear …

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Footnotes

  • Competing interests None declared.

  • Provenance and peer review Commissioned; internally peer reviewed.