Maternal health care services in waiting mothers’ shelters: the case of Mawadza village in Bonda, Manicaland, Zimbabwe

Muchabveyo, Brenda Hamufari

Title: Maternal health care services in waiting mothers’ shelters: the case of Mawadza village in Bonda, Manicaland, Zimbabwe
Creator: Muchabveyo, Brenda Hamufari
Subject: Pregnant women Zimbabwe Manicaland Province
Subject: Women's shelters Zimbabwe Manicaland Province
Subject: Maternal health services Zimbabwe Manicaland Province
Subject: Integrative medicine
Subject: Childbirth Social aspects Zimbabwe Manicaland Province
Date Issued: 2021
Date: 2021
Type: Academic theses
Type: Doctoral theses
Type: text
Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/476912
Identifier: vital:78017
Identifier: DOI 10.21504/10962/476912
Description: This study explores the experiences and perceptions of expectant mothers during prenatal, intra-, and postpartum care. It focuses on expectant mother‘s use or non-use of a waiting mothers' shelter within a medical pluralistic village within a context where hospitals and maternal health care facilities are not proximate. Special focus was on Mawadza village in the Mutasa district in Manicaland Province of Zimbabwe. A sample of 48 participants was used for collecting data in this study. The sample consisted of 15 women some of whom were expectant mothers in the waiting mothers‘ shelter (11) and others had used (4) the shelter once or twice since 2015. Participants were drawn mainly from Mawadza village and Bonda Mission Hospital while others were from the district and provincial offices of the Ministry of Health and Child Care of Zimbabwe. The study adopted a qualitative research methodology, which employed in-depth interviews; key informant interviews (KIIs) and focus group discussions (FGDs) as the main data gathering strategies. In-depth interviews were conducted with the expectant mothers and those who had formerly used the shelter since 2015, while, key informant interviews were conducted with the hospital staff members, traditional healers and the midwives from Mawadza village. Focus group discussions were also conducted with both male and female community members from Mawadza village. The study carried out face to face interviews and notes were handwritten and transcribed at the end of each day. Data coding was used to analyse data. The paradigms and theoretical underpinnings of the study were influenced by the symbolic interactionist theory. The theory made it possible to understand the social processes of pregnancy and childbirth in the waiting mothers' shelter due to its interpretive approach to social research and the legitimacy it places on the social interaction and meanings that social actors place on interactions in their environments. The study documented the ways pregnancy and childbirth are perceived, understood, and experienced in Mawadza village within the context of medical pluralism. In Mawadza village, pregnancy and childbirth are highly embedded in the cultural beliefs of the local people, hence, treated with importance and assumed important symbolic meanings. On the contrary, the waiting mothers‘ shelter as a biomedical facility handles pregnancy and childbirth from a biomedical approach, basing its practices and operations on pure science. Expectant mothers who await labour in this facility are therefore involved in several biomedical activities during prenatal, intra- and post-partum care in the waiting mothers‘ shelter. The need to access skilled birth attendants and the criminalisation of home births in Mawadza village have been the major reasons that influence the expectant mothers to use the waiting mothers‘ shelter. Nevertheless, factors such as medical pluralism, child care, and family commitments, lack of understanding of the importance of the waiting mothers‘ shelter, lack of privacy in the shelter, and cost of food and utilities during the expectant mothers' stay in this facility among others are factors that deter expectant mothers from using the waiting mothers' shelter. Lack of practice of bodily agency where practices common in preparation for childbirth such as opening the birth canal which is not accepted was also reported among common problems that discourage expectant mothers from preferring use of the shelters. The study also revealed that the community is involved in the operations of the waiting mothers‘ shelter, although, the involvement is gendered since there are more women involved as compared to men. The study concluded that even biological processes such as pregnancy and childbirth can only be fully understood within a social context given the different meanings which are attached to the various aspects of the childbirth process by the various actors such as expectant mothers, mothers, biomedical practitioners, traditional healers and communities in Mawadza village. Also, in a medical pluralistic village, the different health care providers who deal with pregnant women do not necessarily conflict as evidenced by the complementary role of these two (complementary insofar as they achieve collectively desired outcomes, albeit in parallel and (mutually) exclusive means) in caring for women during pregnancy and childbirth.
Description: Thesis (PhD) -- Faculty of Humanities, Sociology, 2021
Format: computer
Format: online resource
Format: application/pdf
Format: 1 online resource (363 pages)
Format: pdf
Publisher: Rhodes University
Publisher: Faculty of Humanities, Sociology
Language: English
Rights: Muchabveyo, Brenda Hamufari
Rights: Use of this resource is governed by the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons "Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike" License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/)

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