Yes / It is becoming increasingly common for midwives to care for women who do not speak English, and UK interpreting services are often inadequate and underused. Persistent language barriers have been found to contribute to maternal and perinatal mortality thus it is essential that these barriers are overcome to provide safe maternity care. This article reports on a two-stage study undertaken to address this. The study aimed to: • Identify difficulties midwives experience when communicating with non-English-speaking women. Through undertaking a group interview with 11 senior students, four themes emerged: accessing interpreters, working with interpreters, cultural barriers and strategies to address persistent language barriers • Explore the feasibility of using mobile devices with a translation application to communicate in clinical practice. Google Translate was tested in a simulated clinical environment with multi-lingual service users. Google Translate was not adequately developed to be safely used in maternity services. However, a maternity-specific mobile application could be built to help midwives and women communicate in the presence of a persistent language barrier.

MCur / Department of Advanced Nursing Sciences / See the attached abstract below

Mozambique is in the process of setting up maternity waiting homes (MWHs) in an attempt to improve access of women living in remote areas. It is expected that MWHs will increase institutional deliveries and consequently, decrease maternal mortality caused by the delay in reaching obstetric care. However, no evidence for this assumption has been found in the literature. The objective of this research was, using Geographical Information Systems (GIS), to assess the impact of MWHs in increasing institutional deliveries coverage. GIS technology is a valuable methodology to analyse access, especially in contexts where official records are weak. An ecological study, using a sample of 28 health facilities, was conducted in six districts in northern Mozambique. The findings suggest that MWHs could contribute to increasing institutional deliveries coverage in a range of 4% to 2 %. However, they do not appear to increase access of women living in remote areas. / M.A. (Public Health)

Current literature has indicated a concern about standards of maternity care experienced by pregnant asylum seeking women. As the next generation of midwives, it would appear essential that students are educated in a way that prepares them to effectively care for pregnant asylum seekers. Consequently, this study examined the way in which midwifery students constructed a pregnant asylum seeker's health and social needs, the discourses that influenced their constructions and the implications of these findings for midwifery education. For the duration of year two of a pre-registration midwifery programme, eleven midwifery students participated in the study. Two focus group interviews using a problem based learning (PBL) scenario were conducted. In addition, three students were individually interviewed and two students' written reflections on practice were used to construct data. Following a critical discourse analysis, dominant discourses were identified which appeared to influence the way that pregnant asylum seekers were perceived. The findings suggested an underpinning discourse around the asylum seeker as different and of a criminal persuasion. In addition, managerial and medico-scientific discourses were identified, which appeared to influence how midwifery students approach their care of women in general, at the expense of a woman centred, midwifery perspective. The findings from this study were used to develop 'the pregnant woman within the global context' model for midwifery education and it is recommended that this be used in midwifery education, to facilitate the holistic assessment of pregnant asylum seekers' and other newly arrived migrants' health and social needs.

This thesis is an ethnographic study of a little documented indigenous group, the Warekena people, who live on the Xié River in north-western Amazonia. Examining the mythic histories of the animate riverscape, my work offers an overview of the emergence of riverside dwelling: starting with a macro view of Xié river lifestyles, I explain how seasonal and distinguishing historic-mythic narratives tie in to wider idioms, and to experiences of social reproduction. I focus on reproductive processes and the perinatal period, highlighting methods used by Xié dwellers to nurture healthy, quality-conscious lifestyles, and I examine Xié aetiologies and pathologies. Mindfulness, or awareness, is viewed as a key component of good health. In this context, healthy childbirth is for the birthing mother an art form, a practice for which her total life experience has prepared her. Childbirth is ranked with such other painful experiences as snakebite, and both childbirth and snakebite are opportunities for personal growth. Infant care is seen through the lens of specific, hands-on techniques that promote mindful states in both the carer and the cared for. Mindfulness emerges as a heuristic device that allows us to scrutinize the Amerindian soul and body, also elucidating soul-loss in the ‘animist’ lived world. I argue that mindfulness is a core characteristic of the ‘cool’ hydrocentric and status-conscious lifestyles of Xié river dwellers, and that it defines what it means to be a person, the Xié way.

Submitted in fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree in Masters of Technology in Nursing, Durban University of Technology, Durban, South Africa, 2016. / Introduction Registered midwives are expected to practice their duties within the parameters of their scope of practice. Pregnant women have certain expectations about the midwife and their skills. If such expectations are not met, substandard care occurs. Such substandard care has a negative impact for both the pregnant woman and the Department of Health. Aim of the study The aim of this study was to explore and describe the experiences of midwives working in maternity units, concerning midwifery practice breakdown in maternity units at a public hospital in KZN. Methodology A qualitative research study that was exploratory, descriptive and contextual in nature was conducted. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 13 midwives. Data was transcribed verbatim then organised into codes. Results The study revealed that the majority of the participants faced practice breakdown almost daily and most of the midwifery practice breakdowns start during antenatal care visits. Midwives who attended to pregnant women during antenatal care did not follow set protocols and guidelines and this resulted in complications during delivery. Most midwives were emotionally stressed and did not wish to continue practicing midwifery. Midwives were of the opinion that the management did not care about their challenges and did nothing to resolve the challenges. / M

Le principal objectif de ce mémoire est l’étude de l’inscription de la maternité dans L’empreinte de l’ange, La virevolte et Prodige de Nancy Huston. Les trois romans précités constituent mon corpus de base. Néanmoins, des allusions à d’autres écrits de l’auteure, notamment à Journal de la création, donneront une plus grande profondeur à l’analyse, car on ne peut ni écarter les traces du thème de la maternité dans ses autres textes ni mésestimer l’influence de l’expérience de l’auteure sur son œuvre. Dans la foulée de la réflexion féministe contemporaine sur la maternité et faisant recours, selon le besoin, à la Nouvelle Histoire et à la psychanalyse, pour éclairer le contexte sociohistorique et le non-dit des textes, nous essaierons de dégager la singularité de l’écriture hustonienne en ce qui concerne ses idées sur la maternité. En effet, Nancy Huston s’inscrit dans la lignée d’écrivaines qui ont contribué à redéfinir l’identité féminine dans la fiction contemporaine en esquissant, à travers ses romans et essais, une multiplicité d’expériences féminines, toutes différentes, bien que plus ou moins soumises aux valeurs sociales dont l’auteure mesure la force. Nous abordons notre analyse par une mise en contexte historique, culturelle et éthique de la maternité. En effet, comme le thème de la maternité est omniprésent dans le discours social passé et contemporain, il est intéressent de voir comment Nancy Huston compose avec les stéréotypes traditionnellement attribués à la mère en suivant les enjeux, les conséquences et les variations de la maternité dans les œuvres à l’étude. Suivront à la mise en contexte historique et théorique les chapitres destinés à l’analyse des œuvres. Le deuxième chapitre portera sur L’empreinte de l’ange dévoilant les perplexités qui naissent d’une maternité non désirée et ombragée par les séquelles d’un passé tragique. Le troisième chapitre, consacré à l’analyse de La virevolte, s’articule autour de la tension entre la création et la procréation. Enfin, le quatrième et dernier chapitre aborde la maternité dans Prodige, roman où il est surtout question du lien entre emprise maternelle et construction de l’identité de la fille. À travers cette analyse, nous verrons comment Nancy Huston déconstruit le lieu commun voulant que la mère soit cet être idéalisé, privé de passions professionnelles et de pulsions artistiques, se dédiant uniquement à la protection et aux soins de l’enfant pour représenter plutôt des mères animées par des sentiments contradictoires, des mères qui se positionnent avant tout comme femmes sans inhiber leurs élans, leurs passions ni leurs tourments. / The main purpose of this master’s paper is the study of the theme of maternity in Nancy Huston’s novels L’empreinte de l’ange, La virevolte and Prodige. The three aforesaid novels constitute the basic corpus of our study. Nevertheless, allusions to the other essays by the author, in particular to Journal de la création, will give a major depth to the analysis, because we cannot push aside the traces of the theme of maternity in her other writings nor underestimate the influence of the experience of the author on her work. Influenced by the ideas of the contemporary feminist reflexion to redefine the maternal experience and recurring, according to the needs, to the New History’s and the psychoanalysis’s theories, to enlighten the sociohistorical context and the unspoken of the texts, we shall try to find the peculiarity of Nancy Huston’s writing regarding maternity. In fact, Nancy Huston, by sketching through her novels a multiplicity of feminine experiences more or less influenced by social values, joins the lineage of women writers which have contributed to redefine the feminine identity in contemporary fiction. We approach our analysis by an historical, cultural, and ethical contextualization of the ideas surrounding maternity. As the subject of maternity is present in the past and contemporary social discourse, it is interesting to see how Nancy Huston composes with stereotypes traditionally attributed to mothers by following the consequences and the variations of maternity in her novels. The study of the novels follows this contextualization. The second chapter concerns L’empreinte de l’ange and reveals the perplexities which arise from a maternity that is unwanted and shaded by the after effects of a tragic past. The third chapter, dedicated to the analysis of La virevolte is articulated around the tension between creation and procreation. Finally, the fourth and last chapter studies the theme of maternity in Prodigy, a novel that reveals the link between maternal influence and the construction of the daughter’s identity. Through this entire study, we shall see how Nancy Huston deconstructs the common idea wanting that the mother is an idealized being, deprived of professional passions and artistic drives, dedicated only to the protection and to the care of the child. On the contrary, the author represents mothers animated by contradictory feelings, mothers who position themselves as women without inhibiting their passions nor their agonies.

Mémoire numérisé par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal.

Mémoire numérisé par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal.

Determination of Parenthood The topic of my thesis is Determination of parenthood. The reason why I chose this topic is because it combines legal, historical, social and ethical aspects. Goal of my thesis is to analyse legal institute and raise awareness about its problems. The thesis is concerned with determination of maternity, determination of paternity and denying of paternity. Diploma thesis is divided into five chapters. First chapter is Introduction, in which I determine the extent of the thesis. Second chapter deals with historical development of legal regulation of determination of parenthood. This chapter comprises of three subchapters. First is concerned with determination of parenthood in ancient Rome. Second explains determination of parenthood in ABGB. Third explains the Czech legal regulation between 1948 and 2014. Third chapter is about contemporary legal regulation. Chapter is divided in three subchapters. First deals with determination of maternity. Second deals with determination of paternity. Third deals with denying of paternity. Fourth chapter reports on decisions of European Court of Human Rights. It outlines concrete cases a tries to summarise, how the court decides in question of determination of parenthood. Last chapter summarises the whole thesis with conclusion that...