Women's experience with early labour management at home vs. in hospital: A randomised controlled trial

Objective

to compare experiences with early labour assessment and support at home vs. by telephone.

Design

a randomised controlled trial of nurse home visits vs. telephone support for assessment and support of women in early labour.

Setting

hospitals serving obstetrical populations in metropolitan and suburban Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

Participants

healthy nulliparous women in labour at term with uncomplicated pregnancies participating in the third and fourth year of the trial.

Intervention

women were randomised to receive early labour assessment and support at home (n=241) and or to receive assessment and support by telephone (n=182).

Measurement

the Early Labour Experience Questionnaire (ELEQ), a 26-item self-administered questionnaire that measures women's experience with early labour care across three domains: emotional well-being, emotional distress and perceptions of nursing care.

Findings

women who received home visits rated their early labour experience more positively overall compared to women who received telephone support (103.14±12.45 vs. 99.67±13.11, p<.01)including perceptions of nursing care that they received (38.64±2.90 vs. 36.82±4.09, p<.001). However, women's affective experiences did not differ.

Key conclusions

early labour nursing care provided at home is associated with a more positive experience of early labour compared to telephone support.