Pregnancy and antenatal care: the attitudes and experiences of Asian women

Abstract

Asian women living in the East End of London were interviewed in English or in their own language to assess their attitudes to and experiences of pregnancy and antenatal care and to consider some factors which may influence their experiences, especially their fluency in English. In some respects Asian women's experiences were similar to those of non-Asian women reported in other studies, e.g. similar levels of nausea and lack of tie-up between nausea and negative reactions to pregnancy. However there were also some differences, e.g. Asian women expressed greater concern about the sex of the child and about eating 'cool' foods to counterbalance the hot state of pregnancy. Asian women were good patients: they attended antenatal clinics, read the leaflets provided and about half attended antenatal classes, although some were keener than others to seek information about pregnancy and childbirth and only a quarter bought books or watched videos. Less than half of the women were living in extended families and receiving support from in-laws in the traditional way. Those living in nuclear families received support from friends, neighbours and especially husbands. There were considerable individual differences in women's reactions and experiences. Women who spoke little or no English were less knowledgeable and had lived for a shorter time in the UK than women who were fluent in English. Leaflets in languages women can read and link workers at clinics helped some women.

Immigrant and non-immigrant women’s experiences of maternity care: a systematic and comparative review of studies in five countries

“…First, language difficulties clearly hamper good communication and understanding between immigrant women and their caregivers when women are not fluent in the language of the receiving country. Communication difficulties were identified as a key problem in almost all the immigrant studies [25-29,32-35,38-45,47-49,51,55]. Lack of information in community languages and insufficient access to interpreters when needed were also commonly reported and a few studies noted that even when interpreters were available, women did not always feel that they were competent [25,45,47].…”

“…Communication difficulties were identified as a key problem in almost all the immigrant studies [25-29,32-35,38-45,47-49,51,55]. Lack of information in community languages and insufficient access to interpreters when needed were also commonly reported and a few studies noted that even when interpreters were available, women did not always feel that they were competent [25,45,47]. Lack of familiarity with how care is provided or not receiving adequate information about what options for care exist, were also common problems for immigrant women [26,28-32,35-38,41,48,50,51].…”

The maternity information concerns of Somali women in the United Kingdom

“…Similarly, Woollett and Dosanjh-Matwala (1990) observed that some midwives held prejudices about minority ethnic women who were perceived to be unable or unwilling to manage their fertility. Women were particularly dissatis®ed with information provided by midwives.…”

Immigrants’ Experiences of Maternity Care in Japan

“…Interview-based studies from several countries revealed unique rituals surrounding birth, and birth experiences of immigrant women in host countries [12–16]. Given the uniqueness of cultures’ birthing experiences, nursing researchers have introduced the subject of culturally competent or transcultural nursing for the nursing curriculum, and also actual programs of culturally competence or transcultural nursing care [17].…”