Midwives' views on pelvic floor muscle exercises during pregnancy

Abstract

Pelvic floor muscle exercises are believed to be the mam method for prevention and non - surgical treatment for urinary stress incontinence in pregnancy. Midwives as health promoters and educators are in the best position to provide pelvic floor exercise instructions because they care for women in the preconception, antenatal and postnatal periods. The aim of the research study is to explore how midwives perceive pelvic floor muscle exercises and their views on the benefits and effectiveness of such exercises antenatal. For that reason descriptive survey was conducted looking at midwives' perceptions and views. Midwives held various midwifery qualifications. They were from different midwifery sites in one General Hospital in Malta Convenience sampling was used including 25 midwives. Data was obtained from self-administered, semi-structured questionnaire. A total of 25 questionnaires were distributed to midwives and 20 (80%) responded. The findings from the study revealed that although aware of the effects and benefits of pelvic floor muscle exercises, midwives showed limited understanding of what these consist of. Most midwives were not provided with special training on how to teach such exercises. The participants of the study believed that these exercises should receive more attention in the ongoing and post-graduate midwifery education programmes. Moreover it was pointed out that those exercises should be made explicit in the policies and protocols governing practices. One of the main limitations is the small scale nature of the study and therefore the findings are not generalisable to the local situation.