Design and Implementation of a Group Prenatal Care Model for Somali Women at a Low-Resource Health Clinic

OBJECTIVE: To design and implement group prenatal care (GPC) for Somali women and to evaluate participants' satisfaction, knowledge, and care engagement.

DESIGN: Quality improvement project.

SETTING/LOCAL PROBLEM: A federally qualified health center in an urban Midwestern setting, which serves a largely East African immigrant and refugee population.

PARTICIPANTS: Pregnant Somali women at more than 20 weeks gestation receiving prenatal care at the project site. Many participants were non-English speaking.

INTERVENTION/MEASUREMENTS: While honoring the 13 essential elements of CenteringPregnancy, the model was adapted to the East African population at the project site and offered to all eligible women receiving individual prenatal care at the clinic. Women attended biweekly sessions, including individual assessment and education, exposure to integrative health therapies, and group discussion. Pre- and postintervention data were collected in surveys and in-depth interviews from March through August 2017.

RESULTS: Seventeen Somali women attended a median of two sessions (range = 1-7). Self-reported results for knowledge of safe exercise in pregnancy (p = .02), exclusive breastfeeding (p = .04), what happens in the hospital (p = .02), and stress management (p = .03) increased after GPC participation. Ninety-three percent of women preferred GPC to individual care.

CONCLUSION: When adapted to meet the needs of Somali women, GPC has the potential to improve care satisfaction, increase knowledge, and reduce stress during pregnancy and the postpartum period. This model may interest women and care providers in similar community health care settings.