Antenatal Physical Activity Counseling Among HCPs

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Despite the fact that the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecologists recommends pregnant women who are free of obstetrical complications engage in the recommended levels of regular leisure physical activity (RLPA), women who are pregnant engage in less RLPA than their non-pregnant counterparts. Healthcare providers play an integral role in advising pregnant women about health behaviors; however, it is unclear as to what extent healthcare providers provide counseling on antenatal physical activity in primary care settings. Thus, the present study aims to 1)modify a pre-existing tool to assess healthcare providers' attitudes, beliefs, knowledge, barriers and practices related to antenatal physical activity; 2) Conduct a surveillance study, using the aforementioned tool, to assess healthcare providers' attitudes, beliefs, knowledge, perceived barriers and practices related to antenatal physical activity; 3) Explore potential variation in these relationships by type of healthcare provider (i.e. physician, midwife) and by specialty (i.e. obstetrics, and family medicine); and 4) Conduct a pre/post analyses to test the effects of providing antenatal physical activity educational and community resources to healthcare providers on antenatal physical activity beliefs and practices. The study will involve survey content development/preliminary testing of the survey, and web-based survey implementation. The web-based survey will be administered to healthcare providers (i.e. physician and midwives) residing in the Denver-Aurora Metropolitan Statistical Area who practice in either obstetrics or family medicine (N=414). Data will be analyzed for trends and patterns among specialties and types of healthcare providers on current attitudes, beliefs, self- efficacy, barriers, and practices on antenatal physical activity counseling. These data will help design sensitive and targeted community-specific models to improve antenatal physical activity counseling in primary care settings. The proposed study will also test the effects of providing educational materials on antenatal physical activity to healthcare providers to enhance counseling efforts. Overall, the proposed study is designed to provide insight for future intervention development to increase the knowledge base, enhance communication style, and address barriers to antenatal physical activity counseling among healthcare providers in primary care settings. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: The proposed project will conduct a surveillance study to better understand healthcare providers' current attitudes, beliefs, perceived barriers and current practices to antenatal physical activity counseling. The proposed project will also provide educational material to healthcare providers to enhance future antenatal counseling efforts in primary care settings. Information gained from this study will help to design effective interventions aimed at enhancing antenatal physical activity counseling in primary care.