SINGAPORE – Spending five years in a delivery suite and postnatal ward as a nurse and midwife brought Dr Shefaly Shorey the realisation of a gap in existing postnatal supportive care that led to her PhD study and doctorate.

“We realised that many first-time mothers in the postnatal ward were reluctant to go home despite the crunch in bed vacancies, mostly because they were not confident of being alone. As a midwife and mother myself, it’s something very close to my heart, to provide this continuity of care,” said the Nanyang Polytechnic lecturer.

In developing what she dubs a “postnatal psychoeducation programme”, Dr Shorey, 35, noted the extensive nature of programmes in other countries, such as the United Kingdom, during her research, seeking to adapt them to the local context.

“The bulk of these countries were doing a lot for first-time mothers, we felt that we could incorporate these practices here, by conducting a qualitative interview to meet the specific needs of a very multi-cultural and multi-racial group of mothers with their own opinions,” she explained.

The programme was initially tested on about 200 mothers, where it was well-received and deemed beneficial to boosting their self-confidence. It featured one 90-minute home visit by a midwife after a mother had given birth, an educational booklet, as well as three weekly follow-up phone calls. Visits were conducted often in the presence of a care provider for the mothers, such as husbands and their mothers, to build stronger social support.

Completing her PhD studies in a record time of two and a half years at the Alice Lee Centre for Nursing Studies in the National University of Singapore, Dr Shorey said the journey was not without its challenges.

“I had to study through the night, send my son to school, catch a few hours of sleep, then head off for afternoon classes again, it required a lot of discipline and sacrifices in family time,” she added, before joking that her son’s impending Primary School Leaving Examination was the main motivation for completing her studies quickly.

Looking to the future, the programme is currently awaiting a grant from the Ministry of Health to launch a pilot study on taking it online. Dr Shorey, noting that cost-effectiveness would be a key consideration, said: “If it achieves the same outcome, bringing (the programme) online could help many, many mothers soon.”