Conclusions
This study has identified factors affecting Irish obstetricians
competence and confidence in performing an OVD, including patient, team
clinician and training factors. Practical recommendations as a result of
the study would be the importance of ongoing training in OVD throughout
training and reiterating the importance of senior clinical (medical and
midwifery) support. Future studies may wish to review the impact of
effect of seniority of midwifery attendance on delivery outcome for
operative vaginal deliveries, patients opinions of a clinicians
competence and confidence, or on potential gender differences in
Obstetrics.
[Word Count Discussion and Conclusions – 1,193]
Declarations:
- Disclosure of Interests: ZA is a junior doctor in training in
Obstetrics and Gynaecology. LC is a medical student. FMcA and MH are
tutors in Obstetrics and Gynaecology. These are personal interests;
the authors have no other financial, political, intellectual or
religious interests to declare.
- Contribution to authorship: MH and ZA developed the study concept. ZA
and LC performed the interviews, analyzed and interpreted the patient
data, all authors (ZA, LC, FMcA, MH) developing themes. All authors
(ZA, LC, FMcA, MH) reviewed the data for final thematic analysis. All
authors (ZA, LC, FMcA, MH) contributed to writing the manuscript, with
MH completing the final draft and subsequent revisions. All authors
(ZA, LC, FMcA, MH) read and approved the final manuscript.
- Ethical approval and consent to participate: Ethics approval was
obtained from National Maternity Hospital Ethics Committee on the
10th of April 2017.
- Funding: This study was completed as part of a Masters in Obstetrics
and Gynaecology, and was unfunded. Therefore no funding body played
any roles in the design of the study and collection, analysis, and
interpretation of data and in writing the manuscript.