New mother-infant dyads are at risk for a host of clinical concerns, including unmet breastfeeding goals, perinatal mood disorders, unsafe infant sleep practices, incontinence, tobacco recidivism, chronic disease and lack of access to acceptable contraception. These problems are extraordinarily common – affecting between one quarter and more than half of the 4 million women who give birth each year – but treatment is uneven, and health care is often fragmented. To our knowledge, no project has identified patient-centered outcomes in this period or prioritized questions for comparative effectiveness studies. Our project aims to address this gap.
The 4th Trimester Project will engage stakeholders around these issues for two in-person meetings, interim webinars and online discussions. The first conference will be held in March in Chapel Hill, NC, immediately following the Breastfeeding and Feminism 2016 Conference.
