Collaborative Maternity Care in Rural Environments:  An Investigation of Regulary and Legislative Barriers

March 2007 - March 2009

Research Team

Principal Investigators:  Jude Kornelsen and Stefan Grzybowski

Support Team:  Shelagh Levangie

Funding Agencies

This project is one of six in the 5-year grant "Appropriate Access to Maternity Services for Rural Parturient Women" funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and Child and Family Research Institute

Communities

Trail

Smithers

* two other communities are pending

Project Summary

The goal of this research is to identify barriers to multidisciplinary models of maternity care within a rural environment and the changes that need to occur to facilitate such models.  Specfic objectives include investigating:

1. Legislative and regulatory barriers;
2. Legal and financial barriers;and
3. Professional (ideological) barriers.

Project Updates

This project is in the early stages of data collection. Early findings will be presented June 19-20 at the Invitational Rural Midwifery Symposium, Vancouver, BC..

The research team has visited Trail on three occasions since the beginning of 2008 and conducted interviews with midwives, physicians, nurses, administrators, policy makers, and birthing women from Trail and outlying communities. The team is currently in the process of analyzing interview data collected, as well as preparing a research report for presentation to the Trail community this summer.

Next, the reseach team will embark on its first interprofessional collaboration trip to Smithers to conduct interviews with key stakeholders.