| Summary: | Background: Few studies have focused on women’s expectations and experience of childbirth pain and what predicts a positive childbirth pain experience. Moreover, few studies have explored childbirth pain from a salutogenic perspective and from the perspective of childbearing women, how they prepare for and manage the pain. Aim: The aim of this doctoral thesis was to increase knowledge about women’s expectations and experiences of childbirth pain and to identify predictors of pregnant women’s expected intensity of childbirth pain and what factors predict a positive childbirth pain experience. Moreover, the aim was to study childbirth pain from a salutogenic perspective and how women prepare for and manage childbirth pain. Methods: The thesis comprise three different studies. In the first study, which was a qualitative study (Paper I) the Vancouver School of doing Phenomenology was used as a research approach. Data were collected with open interviews with 14 women, selected through purposeful sampling, who had been healthy and had undergone normal labour and produced healthy babies not less than 8 hours to four days before the interview took place. In the second study (Paper II), a cross-sectional survey and self-reported questionnaires were used to collect data from pregnant women (n=1111) in Iceland early in the pregnancy, at 26 of the largest primary healthcare centres in Iceland. This consecutive national sample was stratified by residency, the questionnaires were posted to women that had agreed to take part in the study, and the response rate was 63%. The third study (Paper III) was a population-based cross-sectional cohort study, where the participants in Study II were sent a questionnaire five to six months after childbirth. Data from 726 women were used after removing data for women who had pre-planned C-sections. The response rate was 68%. In all the studies, the focus was on salutogenic outcomes and their connection to other factors in women’s own expectations and experience of childbirth pain. Results: ...
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