The perinatal period can be a time of increased psychological distress, with up to 9% of women experiencing depression during pregnancy and up to 16% suffering from postnatal depression.
There is considerable evidence that maternal psychological distress during the perinatal period has detrimental effects on the mother, and impacts on the enduring mother-infant relationship. Therefore, preventing poor mental health during this period is an important public health concern.
There is substantial evidence that psychological programs delivered online can be effective in treating and preventing mental health problems, however uptake of these programs can be suboptimal and there remains a lack of evidence around how to increase engagement with evidence-based programs
Timeout for Wellbeing aims to determine if pregnant women’s willingness to engage in an online wellbeing program varies across different online wellbeing program types (i.e. self-compassion, mindfulness or relaxation).
The pilot randomised clinical trial (RCT), Mums Minds Matter (another ORIGINS sub-project), is currently in progress at The Kids Research Institute Australia, where the primary aim is to test an initial protocol for a larger-scale RCT comparing online mindfulness and self-compassion training (including a relaxation control group). The Timeout for Wellbeing study will assess the willingness to engage by the type of online wellbeing program on offer and evaluating the 'lived' experience of women who participate in an antenatal minimal contact wellbeing RCT i.e. Mums Minds Matter.
Objectives for this study are:
- To compare willingness to engage among pregnant women randomly assigned to three diffferent intervention conditions.
- To assess factors influencing willingness to engage, including perceived barriers, facilitators, and attitudes to engagement.
- To determine whether those who are willing to engage differ from those who are not willing based on sociodemographic and psychosocial factors, and health service engagement.
This study will assess different barriers and facilitators described by pregnant women that influence willingness to engage in different types of online well-being antenatal programs.
The information gained from this study will help to determine which interventions will be used by the most people, and potentially which programs will be undertaken by women in high distress.
Understanding their reasons for using/not using the interventions will enable tailoring of engagement strategies for minimal contact well-being programs for antenatal women.