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Factors related to exercise over the course of pregnancy including women's beliefs about the safety of exercise during pregnancy.

Version 2 2024-06-04, 05:27
Version 1 2017-07-27, 10:25
journal contribution
posted on 2024-06-04, 05:27 authored by D Duncombe, EH Wertheim, H Skouteris, SJ Paxton, L Kelly
OBJECTIVE: to explore pregnant women's exercise patterns across pregnancy, reported reasons for exercising or not exercising, beliefs about the safety of exercise during pregnancy and the association of those beliefs with the amount and intensity of exercise that women participated in. DESIGN: a prospective questionnaire-based approach was implemented over three pregnancy time points 8 weeks apart, with retrospective pre-pregnancy data obtained at the first time point. SETTING: participants were mailed questionnaires at 16-23-weeks pregnancy (T1), 24-31-weeks pregnancy (T2), and 32-38-weeks pregnancy (T3). PARTICIPANTS: a total of 158 pregnant women participated. MEASUREMENTS: at 16-23-weeks pregnancy women completed an Exercise Safety Beliefs Questionnaire in which they described their beliefs about the safety of low to medium exercise, high intensity exercise, gentle exercise, and weight bearing exercise. At T1, T2 and T3 reasons for exercising and not exercising were described, and participants maintained a 1-week exercise diary in which they recorded amount and intensity of physical activity. Physical symptoms experienced over time were also reported. FINDINGS: the amount and intensity of exercise decreased over the course of pregnancy, with main reasons for not exercising including feeling tired or unwell, being too busy, and, particularly in late pregnancy, exercise being uncomfortable. Some women also reported safety concerns. Safety concerns predicted amount and/ or intensity of exercise. KEY CONCLUSIONS: overall, most women had clear beliefs about what forms of exercise were safe or not safe during pregnancy. Women who rated gentle and low to medium exercise as unsafe reported engaging in less intense and fewer minutes of exercise. IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE: information and discussion about ways to exercise safely, enjoyably, and comfortably should be offered to pregnant women by health professionals in early pregnancy, when safety beliefs may impact on women's exercise patterns across pregnancy, and throughout pregnancy since the most appropriate forms of exercise may need to be modified over time.

History

Journal

Midwifery

Volume

25

Pagination

430-438

Location

Scotland

ISSN

0266-6138

eISSN

1532-3099

Language

eng

Publication classification

CN.1 Other journal article

Issue

4

Publisher

Elsevier