MATERNITY CARE
The way in which a pregnancy is shared with family, friends and social groups is dependent on the individual woman’s culture, values, knowledge, beliefs and world view
by the mother has been lost during the past 100 years due to western medicalisation.4
Medicalisation has
continued to the detriment of the psychosocial aspects of pregnancy and childbirth, which is a unique experience for every woman physically, emotionally and socially. The way in which a pregnancy is shared with family, friends and social groups is dependent on the individual woman’s culture, values, knowledge, beliefs and world view. Cultural elements such as language, religion and ethnicity as well as political and educational factors also affect an individual’s behaviour and perception.4 Bezerra and Cardoso5
agree that
culture influences human behaviour and that in order to communicate with the patient, health professionals must understand their world view, beliefs, values and customs. Likewise, the care giver or care setting should reflect the culture, values, beliefs and experiences of a pregnant woman during childbirth. The characteristics and qualities of a
space give it personal meaning. Malard explains that with the appropriation of spaces, people also humanise them.6 Appropriation involves reciprocal user/ space interaction, which is shaped according to the individual’s needs and desires. This is the reason why people identify themselves positively or negatively with the various places they visit. Receptive places are those in which
people experience harmony and find their individual and collective identity. In addition to the subjective elements of identifying with a place, ambience also relates to objective elements, such as the sensations experienced there. While the subjective aspects relate to the physical and the aesthetic, the objective aspects relate to the thermal, acoustic, light and dimensional conditions. Both aspects affect human behaviour and perception. Subjective aspects relate to culture, while objective aspects relate to physical needs. The subjective dimension relates to the meaning of objects, which depends on
IFHE DIGEST 2018
the dominant culture of the group and is revealed through customs and trends. Subjectivity confers a particular meaning to the arrangement of these objects. The objective dimension relates to the comfort that people experience in the built environment. Ambience depends on the values that relate to culture.6
Culture
acts as a transforming force that is not only linked to the country where the individual was born and the economic and social situation within that country or geographic region, but is also influenced by a myriad of other factors, such as age, gender and academic background.7
Ambience and childbirth Individuals from different cultures perceive architectural spaces in different ways. It is therefore important to identify these differences in order to understand them better. For example, groups such as gypsies, even if they are extremely traditional, often seek mainstream medicine in emergency situations. Once a gypsy woman knows she is pregnant, she is likely to seek prenatal and birth monitoring by health professionals, although examinations and childbirth are closely monitored by the whole family.8 In Japanese culture, fathers are not
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In addition to the facilities commonly found in any hospital of this type, the room includes several elements used during childbirth in the villages. There is a glass tube for mothers to blow into, which, according to some cultures, helps during labour, a stool for pregnant women who choose to give birth squatting, a rustic rope suspended so they can squat and paintings by indigenous artists on the walls. The indigenous women have the opportunity to bring a companion and a midwife from the village, who can offer emotional support and help during the birth.
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