Title : Digital health interventions to improve maternal and birth outcomes: First findings of a scoping review
Abstract:
Background: Most children in Germany are born in maternity hospitals. These hospitals offer parents a low- threshold and uncomplicated way to be reached without feeling stigmatized (Scharmanski & Renner 2019). In maternity hospitals, health professionals can recognize early on the parents stress situations, educational needs or resources. Together they can provide appropriate support services. Therefore, health professionals play a guiding role by accompanying parents from the maternity hospital to further social and health networks. In this context the integration of digital health technologies is legally required by Krankenhauszukunftsgesetz (KHZG) and the digitalis Versorgungsgesetz (DVG) and numerous studies have shown that digital health technologies can be an effective intervention to improve maternal and birth outcomes.
Objective: The aim is to present first findings of a scoping review to map and assess published studies on digital health interventions to improve pregnancy care.
Methods: A scoping review will be conducted, including scientific publications in English and German language published from 2008. A systematic database search will performed in MEDLINE via PubMed, CINAHL, Cochrane Library, IEEE Xplore Digital Library, ScienceDirect and PsycINFO. Title/Abstract and the full-text of results from the database search will screened independently by two authors to finally select the studies. Peer-reviewed qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods studies that evaluated digital health interventions to improve maternal and birth outcomes were included.
Preliminary results: A first oriented search identified studies of digital health interventions, for example smartphone self-care applications, to help pregnant women during the corona pandemic (Moulaei et al. 2021). Other studies describe counseling interventions via telehealth for health promotion, health tracking and education (Oelmeier et al. 2022; Nur et al., 2020). Furthermore, digital health technologies can support for example mental and physical wellness of pregnant women, health education and parenting support (Moise et al., 2023).
Audience Take Away Notes:
• Explain how the audience will be able to use what they learn?
When health professionals play a guiding role by accompanying parents from the maternity hospital to wider social and health networks, they can integrate digital health technologies into the care process
• How will this help the audience in their job?
The findings demonstrate that digital health technologies such as mHealth and telehealth have potential for supporting pregnancy health care
• Is this research that other faculty could use to expand their research or teaching?
• Does this provide a practical solution to a problem that could simplify or make a designer’s job more efficient?
• Will it improve the accuracy of a design, or provide new information to assist in a design problem? There is also a need for more randomized clinical trials and longitudinal studies to better understand the effectiveness and feasibility of implementing digital health interventions in pregnancy health care
• List all other benefits
