St. Mary’s Hospital in Montreal is getting ready to institute a “quiet time” for mothers and babies in the maternity ward.
Scheduled to begin in the spring, the team is now monitoring the noises and interruptions on the ward to decide what must change to allow new mothers 90 minutes of rest in the afternoon.
“The afternoon would be a good moment, as the body reaches a natural low” Safina Adatia explained. Adatia, a graduate student, is following the effect of the implementation of these measures for her Master’s thesis.
ListenDr. Susan Law, a co-author, Associate Professor in Family Medicine at McGill University and Vice President of Academic Affairs at St. Mary’s, explained, “The idea is fairly new in maternity wards, but daily quiet times have been implemented and evaluated in other units, such as intensive care units, where they have been effective.”
An American study found new mothers in maternity wards experience about 53 interrruptions every 12 hours from people entering the room. This disrupts sleep, interferes with breastfeeding opportunities and causes stress.
A new mother’s health can be effected in various ways from decreased immune function to stress-related cardio-vascular problems and postpartum mental health disorders, according to the McGill researchers, in a commentary published in the journal BMC Health Services Research.
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