Japanese Nurse Incorporates HUG into her PhD Research

Development of a Web-Based Comprehensive Educational Programme for Nurses to Facilitate Mother-Infant Bonding

Yasue Otal,  Mari Takahashi 

 Juntendo University graduate school of health care and nursing Doctoral course　

 Juntendo University Faculty of health care and nursing

Juntendo University graduate school of health care and nursing

Background: 

Yasue Ota on right

The acknowledgement of the importance of the role nurses can play in facilitating mother-infant bonding during the very early postnatal period has created many interventions. But most of them don’t seem to function as well as expected due to low availability, and requirement of rigorous training and certification. This motivated us to develop a user-friendly, easy-to-access, web-based comprehensive training programme for nurses to effectively enhance their responsiveness to postnatal mother-infant bonding.

Methods: 

First, observations of nurses and mother-baby dyads were conducted. Then, semi-structured interviews with those nurses were implemented to generate a structural nursing care model for facilitating mother-infant bonding during the early postpartum period. Finally, this model and a literature review were synthesized. And then the theory of the ICE model (F. Young) and the Reflective approach model (G. Gibbs) were applied to design our educational programme. It was pilot-tested with ten midwives at a birth centre.

Results: Our educational programme comprises a web-based programme and a case study through reflection on clinical practice. The web-based programme has three following steps: Step 1, application of HUG Your Baby programme (J. Tedder) to enhance knowledge and skills about infants’ behaviours; Step2, construction of effective communication skills and sustainable childrearing support to engage as an “Attacher”, who helps enhance mother-infant bonding and; Step 3, case studies for incorporation of acquired knowledge and skills into clinical practice. The process evaluation generated positive feedback regarding its course length, interestingness and levels of difficulty.

Conclusion: 

This comprehensive educational programme for nurses has the potential to contribute to facilitating nurses’ responsiveness to infants and mother-infant bonding in the early postnatal period.

Keywords: early postnatal nursing care, mother-infant bonding, educational programme

References: 

Yasue Ota, Mari Takahashi (2016). Nurses’ support to facilitate mother-infant attachment during the early postpartum period. Japanese Journal of Maternal Health, 56(4), 618-625.