Women's Birth Experience and Neonatal Outcomes, Study Design and Methodology with Baseline Characteristics. A Hospital-Based Maternal Follow-up Study

Abstract Background: Giving birth is a joyful, unique event and a highly individual experience in a woman's life. Childbirth experience has a significant role in developing self-confidence and positive feelings for the newborn. This experience is affected by many factors, including the mode of delivery. This paper tries to depict the experience of labor, delivery, and neonatal outcomes observed during the implementation of labor and delivery outcome study at selected hospitals in Eastern Ethiopia hospitals. Method: A hospital-based follow-up study was implemented in Hiwot Fana and Jegula Hospital in Harar, Bisidimo hospital in Eastern Hararghe, Oromia, and Dil-Chora Hospital in Dire Dawa from June 2020 to October 2020. A total of 2246 women with labor experience visited the hospitals were followed from delivery until discharge to document their experience and neonates' outcomes. Data were collected through a face-to-face interview using a structured pre-tested questionnaire. A Phenomenological approach qualitative study design will also be employed from April to May 2021. The women who give birth to normal single-term newborns through vaginal or a cesarean section will be included in the study. Women with stillbirth twin, preterm and congenital malformation, serous ill neonates, and who admitted to for more than one week will be excluded because those women will be extreme or deviant cases. In-depth interviews coupled with tape recording and note-taking will be to collect the data. A semi-structured interview guide will consider four domains of the Roy adaptation theory: an open-ended question (physiological, self-concept, role and function, and interdependence). Translated files will be transferred to open code software in a plain text format. Coding and categorization will be done on a system to generate a synthesized theme. Discussion The study will provide a comprehensive evaluation of the birth experience and its neonatal outcome in Eastern Ethiopia. Understanding women's birth experience and neonatal outcome based on birth can help health professionals look inside themselves. It will form the foundation and development of a new guideline to improve maternity care.