CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 140Maternal and Perinatal Health InterventionsPatient Satisfaction in HealthcareMaternal and Neonatal Healthcare

Continuity of carer: what matters to women? A review of the evidence

Green, Josephine M, Renfrew, Mary J, Curtis, Penny A·2000·Midwifery
DOI 10.1054/midw.1999.0208
Open this paper in CoChat — free account

Abstract

Objectives To consider how 'continuity of carer' has been defined in the literature and to review the literature on what aspects of continuity matter to women.Design Structured literature review.Setting The first objective was addressed within the context of a review of the organisation of midwifery services in the UK; for the second objective a wider literature was drawn on.Measurements and findings Data were systematically extracted from the identified 'core' studies on the methods used for assessing continuity of carer and on women's satisfaction with periods of care. Continuity of carer was found to be defined in these studies as fewer caregivers, either overall or during pregnancy, or as a known caregiver in labour. Little attention was paid to other possible interpretations of continuity of carer. The literature on what is important to women was found to have used four distinct methods and findings were consistent within methods. Studies comparing women who had and had not had a known carer in labour found no significant differences in satisfaction; those using rankings or ratings found that a known intrapartum carer was a relatively low priority and most of those using open-ended questions found that few women mentioned continuity. In contrast, all studies which asked postnatal women whether a known intrapartum carer was important reported that those who had experienced it said 'yes', while those who had not, generally thought it unimportant.Key conclusions There has been an emphasis in existing literature on continuity of carer but little attempt to assess continuity or quality of care. Limited definitions of continuity of carer have been used. There is no evidence that women who were cared for in labour by a midwife that they had already met were more satisfied than those who were not. Other aspects of woman-centred care were likely to be more important. Women wanted consistent care from caregivers that they trust, but most did not value continuity of carer for its own sake.Implications for practice Limited definitions of continuity of carer seem to be becoming ends in themselves. This has particularly been the case with defining continuity as 'having a known carer in labour'. The available evidence does not justify prioritising this definition of continuity--rather the reverse. This is important for both women and midwives since it opens up other possibilities for organising services that put less strain on midwives' lives and may be equally satisfying for both women and midwives.

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1054/midw.1999.0208

Cites

23 of 23 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Recomputing p-values needs the paper’s full text.

Claims the paper makes

This paper’s full text isn’t openly available, so its claims and self-check weren’t run. The registry and citation checks still apply.

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Related

Authors
Green, J. M., Renfrew, M. J., & Curtis, P. A.
Affiliations
  • University of Leeds (GB)
  • University of Sheffield (GB)
ORCID
Renfrew, Mary J
Venue
Midwifery
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Published
2000-09
Volume
16
Issue
3
Pages
186-196
ISSN
0266-6138 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.1054/midw.1999.0208
OpenAlex
W2084135153
Cited by
140
References
23
Citations by year
2026: 2 · 2025: 2 · 2024: 3 · 2023: 2 · 2022: 2 · 2021: 5 · 2020: 2 · 2019: 2 · 2018: 3 · 2017: 4 · 2016: 7 · 2015: 9 · 2014: 4 · 2013: 8 · 2012: 11
FWCI
5.82
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Licence
Locations
  • Midwifery (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Discovery Research Portal (University of Dundee) (publishedVersion)
Topics
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Obstetrics and Gynecology › Maternal and Perinatal Health Interventions
  • Health Sciences › Health Professions › General Health Professions › Patient Satisfaction in Healthcare
  • Health Sciences › Health Professions › General Health Professions › Maternal and Neonatal Healthcare
Keywords
continuity of carer, midwifery services, intrapartum care, women's satisfaction, woman-centred care, midwife workload, care organization
MeSH terms
Continuity of Patient Care, Female, United Kingdom, Humans, Maternal Health Services, Midwifery, Nurse-Patient Relations, Pregnancy, Quality of Health Care, Surveys and Questionnaires, Women's Health, Patient Satisfaction, Patient-Centered Care

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review