Patients’ perspective of shared decision making at childbirth and association with outcomes in maternity units in Kisumu County, Kenya
Date
2024
Authors
Bitta, C.
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Strathmore University
Abstract
Healthcare systems are geared towards allowing for accessible, quality healthcare while allowing for financial risk protection. Clinician decision making process is one of the determinants of quality of healthcare services offered. Shared decision making process has been associated with improved clinical outcomes. Shared decision making process has three components; clinician expertise, biological and psychological, and patient’s goals and preferences. Whereas the factors affecting the clinician’s decision making process around childbirth are well studied, few studies have been conducted to assess patient perceptions of the decision making process and any associations that may exist with patient characteristics and outcomes of the patient’s care at childbirth. The few studies addressing these aspects are invariably limited to high income countries. Although there are a number of tools used to assess the shared decision making process, the SDMQ-9 tool has been associated with high validity and high reliability. The study design was a cross-sectional descriptive study using a self- administered validated tool, SDM-Q-9 tool. The study population consisted of patients discharged after seeking childbirth services from public level 4 hospitals in Kisumu county. A total of 381 patients were sampled. The data collected was analysed using SPSS version 29.0. The mean patient age of the study population was 25.39 years, most respondents had completed their secondary education and the overall level of satisfaction with shared decision making was 91.3%. There was statistically significant correlation between the perception of information sharing, deliberation and decision making with perception of shared decision making. Patients between the ages of 31-35 had the lowest positive response rates across all three aspects of shared decision making, while patients who did not complete their primary education also reported the lowest positive response rates. Patients who had positive responses on overall perception of shared decision making reported lower self-reported rates of complications during childbirth. Our study recommends increased awareness among healthcare workers on shared decision making, with deliberate effort to improve information sharing, deliberation and patient involvement during childbirth, more so with patients between the ages of 31-35 and patients with lower levels of education.
Description
Full - text thesis
Keywords
Citation
Bitta, C. (2024). Patients’ perspective of shared decision making at childbirth and association with outcomes in maternity units in Kisumu County, Kenya [Strathmore University]. http://hdl.handle.net/11071/15595