Methods
We undertook 14 telephone interviews between November 2017 and June 2018
with pregnant women and recent mothers (within three years of birth)
within the north of Scotland (NHS Highland and NHS Grampian). Women were
invited to participate by local midwifery leads. Women who had
experienced a therapeutic abortion, spontaneous abortion or stillbirth,
suffered early neonatal loss, or had a baby in neonatal intensive care
were not invited. Interested women contacted their midwives who passed
on their details to the research team (HB, VW). Informed consent forms
were emailed to participants at least 2 days before the telephone
interview. Telephone interviews were used to allow women to participate
at a time that suited them from their own home and to reduce travel.
Ethical approval for this research was received from the Research Ethics
Service in Scotland (NHS RES REC reference number 17/ES/0086).
A topic guide was developed with reference to previous qualitative
research with recent mothers.13 The discussion was
wide ranging; participants were asked about their experiences of
maternity care, knowledge of safe pregnancy, risks related to pregnancy
and general concerns that they may have regarding their choice of
birthplace. The interviews were audio-recorded with the participants’
permission, and transcribed verbatim. The transcripts were analysed by
two researchers independently (HB, VW) using an inductive thematic
approach.18, 19 HB and VW developed themes and
sub-themes from their independent reading of the transcripts and their
discussions, and extracted themes and quotes from each transcript. The
anonymised transcripts together with the themes and quotes were shared
with the wider study team.