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Determinants for women's care seeking for birth in low-income setting are multifactorial and remain poorly understood. A life course approach can assist to structure the interplay of the different factors that lead to women seeking care or not. In this study we aimed to explore individual women's reproductive pathways, and increase understanding of how important life events including previous pregnancy and birth experiences can help us to understand individual choices made for care seeking during childbirth. The study took place in Tanzania between 2015 and 2017. 14 women were followed throughout their pregnancy, birth and postpartum period through participant observation and in-depth interviews. In total 94 in-depth interviews were held (between 5–7 interviews per woman). Analysis occurred continuous throughout the data collection period resulting in detailed narratives of crucial events across women's life course, with specific attention to their current pregnancy. Of the 14 women, seven had a facility birth, six a home birth and one woman gave birth at the home of a local birth attendant. Four different story plots were identified: expected home birth, expected facility birth, unexpected facility birth and unexpected home birth. Birth narratives of four women representative of the different story plots are presented. Narratives illustrate women's individual reproductive pathways including the various factors influencing women's expectations and justifications for their actions during their pregnancy and birth. Women's agency, including women's perception of self, the self in relation to the social environment and reflection on risks associated with the range of options, influences the final decision made for birth. Women's narratives suggest that quality of care can function as a primary pull factor for facility birth. As long as home birth is by some perceived to be a better alternative, achieving skilled care for all will be difficult to achieve. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Community participation can provide increased understanding and more effective implementation of strategies that seek to improve outcomes for women and newborns. There is limited knowledge on how participatory processes take place and how this affects the results of an intervention. Objective: This paper presents the results of two years of implementing (2013–2015) community groups for maternal health care in Magu District, Tanzania. Method: A total of 102 community groups were established, and 77 completed the four phases of the participatory learning and action cycle. The four phases included identification of problems during pregnancy and childbirth (phase 1), deciding on solutions and planning strategies (phase 2), implementation of strategies (phase 3) and evaluation of impact (phase 4). Community group meetings were facilitated by 15 trained facilitators and groups met monthly in their respective villages. Data was collected as an ongoing process from facilitator and meeting reports, through interviews with facilitators and local leaders and from focus group discussions with community group participants. Results: The majority of groups prioritized problems related to the availability of and accessibility to health services. The most commonly actioned solution was the provision of health education to the community. Almost all groups (95%) experienced a positive impact on the community as results of their actions, including increased maternal health knowledge and positive behaviour changes among health care workers. Facilitators were positive about the community groups, stating that they were grateful for the gained knowledge on maternal health, and positively regarded the involvement of men in community groups, which are traditionally women-only. Conclusion: The process of establishing and undertaking community groups in itself appeared to have a positive perceived impact on the community. However, sustained behaviour change, power dynamics and financial incentives need to be carefully considered during implementation and sustaining the community groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Disrespect and abuse of patients, especially birthing women, does occur in the health sector. This is a violation of women’s fundamental human rights and can be viewed as a consequence of women’s lives not being valued by larger social, economic and political structures. Here we demonstrate how such disrespect and abuse is enacted at an interpersonal level across the continuum of care in Tanzania. We describe how and why women’s exposure to disrespect and abuse should be seen as a symptom of structural violence. Detailed narratives were developed based on interviews and observations of 14 rural women’s interactions with health providers from their first antenatal visit until after birth. Narratives were based on observation of 25 antenatal visits, 3 births and 92 in-depth interviews with the same women. All women were exposed to non-supportive care during pregnancy and birth including psychological abuse, physical abuse, abandonment and privacy violations. Systemic gender inequality renders women excessively vulnerable to abuse, expressed as a normalisation of abuse in society. Health institutions reflect and reinforce dominant social processes and normalisation of non-supportive care is symptomatic of an institutional culture of care that has become dehumanised. Health providers may act disrespectfully because they are placed in a powerful position, holding authority over their patients. However, they are themselves also victims of continuous health system challenges and poor working conditions. Preventing disrespect and abuse during antenatal care and childbirth requires attention for structural inequalities that foster conditions that make mistreatment of vulnerable women possible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Antenatal care is essential to improve maternal and newborn health and wellbeing. The majority of pregnant women in Tanzania attend at least one visit. Since implementation of the focused antenatal care model, quality of care assessments have mostly focused on utilization and coverage of routine interventions for antenatal care. This study aims to assess the quality of antenatal care provision from a holistic perspective in a rural district in Tanzania. Structure, process and outcome components of quality are explored. This paper reports on data collected over several periods from 2012 to 2015 through facility audits of supplies and services, ANC observations and exit interviews with pregnant women. Additional qualitative methods were used such as interviews, focus group observations and participant observations. Findings indicate variable performance of routine ANC services, partly explained by insufficient resources. Poor performance was also observed for appropriate history taking, attention for client’s wellbeing, basic physical examination and adequate counseling and education. Achieving quality improvement for ANC requires increased attention for the process of care provision beyond coverage, including attention for response-based services, which should be assessed based on locally determined criteria. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Antenatal care is essential to promote maternal health. Prior research has focused on barriers women face to attending antenatal care, and improving quality of care is seen as a precondition for better attendance. Digital health tools are seen as a promising instrument to increase the quality of healthcare. It is less clear to what extent the use of digital health tools in low- and middle-income counties would be perceived as beneficial by end-users. The aim of this research was to explore women's experiences with antenatal care, and whether digital health tools would change their perceptions of quality of care. This qualitative research utilised an interpretative phenomenological approach on data from semi-structured in-depth interviews collected in 2016 with 19 randomly selected pregnant women from six different dispensaries in Magu District. Findings showed that pregnant women are motivated to attend antenatal care and are grateful for the services received. However, they also articulated a need for improvements in antenatal care services such as the availability of diagnostic tests and more interactions with healthcare workers. Participants indicated that a digital health tool could help in storing patient files and improving communication with health workers. Our results indicate that pregnant women are positive about the use of digital health tools during antenatal care but that the implementation of such a tool should be implemented in parallel to structural service delivery improvements, such as testing availability.

Preterm birth and abnormal foetal growth increase the risk of perinatal morbidity and mortality. Timely identification of foetuses at risk is critical to improving maternal and neonatal outcomes. The objective of this study was to increase understanding of the quality of foetal growth monitoring during antenatal care in Tanzania. Between 2015 and 2017, 13 women were followed throughout their pregnancy, childbirth and postpartum period. Participants were recruited using a staggered approach at selected health facilities. Data collection included direct observations of 25 of 48 antenatal care consultations, review of the women's antenatal cards, 88 in-depth interviews and participant observation at the health facilities. Six women had facility births and seven had home births. There was one stillbirth, one preterm birth and two term infants died between the age of 3-6 months. Of the 9 newborns with a known birthweight, 3 were possibly growth-restricted. During 12 ANC visits (25%) Symphysis-Fundal Height (SFH) was not recorded and during 22 visits (46%) the recorded Gestational Age (GA) was incorrect. Despite regular assessment of SFH, three possible growth-restricted infants remained undetected. There is a need to improve nurse-midwives ability to determine a reliable GA and improve critical reflection on SFH measurement.

It is widely recognised that high quality antenatal care is a key element in maternal healthcare. Tanzania has a very high maternal mortality ratio of 524 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births. Most maternal deaths are due to preventable causes that can be detected during pregnancy, and antenatal care therefore plays an important role in reducing maternal morbidity and mortality. Unfortunately, quality of antenatal care in Tanzania is low: Research has shown that healthcare workers show poor adherence to antenatal care guidelines, and the majority of pregnant women miss essential services. Digital health tools might improve the performance of healthcare workers and contribute to improving the quality of antenatal care. To this end, an electronic clinical decision and support system (the Nurse Assistant App) was developed and implemented in Tanzania in 2016 to provide digital assistance during antenatal care consultations to healthcare workers. The current study systematically evaluated the development and implementation process of the Nurse Assistant App in Magu District, Tanzania, with the aim of informing future programme planners about relevant steps in the development of a digital health intervention. Desk research was combined with semi-structured interviews to appraise the development process of the digital health tool. We employed the criteria stipulated by Godin et al., which are based on the six steps of Intervention Mapping [IM; Bartholomew Eldredge et al.]. Findings indicated that five of the six steps of IM were completed during the development and implementation of the Nurse Assistant App. Tasks related to community engagement, adjustment to local context, implementation in the practical context in collaboration with local partners, and rigorous evaluation were accomplished. However, tasks related to identifying theory-based behaviour change methods were not accomplished. Based on the lessons learned during the process of developing and implementing the Nurse Assistant App, we conclude that programme developers are recommended to (1) engage the community and listen to their insights, (2), focus on clear programme goals and the desired change, (3), consult or involve a behaviour change specialist, and (4), anticipate potential problems in unexpected circumstances., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2021 van Pelt, Massar, Shields-Zeeman, de Wit, van der Eem, Lughata and Ruiter.)