{"title":"Maternal health in women with spina bifida: A scoping review.","authors":"Yoonhye Ji, Eun Kyoung Choi","doi":"10.1016/j.dhjo.2026.102172","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Background: </strong>An increasing number of women with spina bifida are reaching reproductive age and may consider pregnancy. However, limited evidence on how spina bifida affects maternal health can hinder tailored counseling and guidance, contributing to uncertainty during pregnancy-related decision-making.</p><p><strong>Objective: </strong>This scoping review aimed to synthesize existing literature on maternal health among women with spina bifida, focusing on pregnancy and childbirth outcomes, women's health-related outcomes, care needs, and health-related decision-making across pregnancy, childbirth, and parenting contexts.</p><p><strong>Methods: </strong>This scoping review was conducted in accordance with the five-stage framework proposed by Arksey and O'Malley. PubMed and CINAHL Plus with Full Text were searched using indexed terms and Boolean operators to identify articles published from January 1949 to December 2025.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>Of 2668 records screened, 39 met inclusion criteria. The evidence base was dominated by case reports, with large-scale secondary analyses and qualitative studies emerging recently. Evidence was mapped across pregnancy, childbirth, and parenting. Pregnancy-related evidence included clinical changes and complications, prenatal assessment findings, and subjective pregnancy experiences. Childbirth-related evidence included delivery methods, anesthesia management, delivery characteristics and complications, postpartum strategies reported in case reports, post-delivery symptom changes, and subjective childbirth experiences. Parenting evidence was limited to subjective experiences describing adaptive caregiving strategies.</p><p><strong>Conclusion: </strong>This review synthesizes 77 years of research on maternal health among women with spina bifida across pregnancy, childbirth, and parenting. The findings highlight clinical insights and evidence gaps, underscoring the need for condition-specific, life-course-oriented care and research addressing postpartum recovery, parenting, and women's physical, social, and psychological well-being.</p>","PeriodicalId":49300,"journal":{"name":"Disability and Health Journal","volume":" ","pages":"102172"},"PeriodicalIF":3.0000,"publicationDate":"2026-09-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Disability and Health Journal","FirstCategoryId":"3","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dhjo.2026.102172","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"HEALTH CARE SCIENCES & SERVICES","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Background: An increasing number of women with spina bifida are reaching reproductive age and may consider pregnancy. However, limited evidence on how spina bifida affects maternal health can hinder tailored counseling and guidance, contributing to uncertainty during pregnancy-related decision-making.
Objective: This scoping review aimed to synthesize existing literature on maternal health among women with spina bifida, focusing on pregnancy and childbirth outcomes, women's health-related outcomes, care needs, and health-related decision-making across pregnancy, childbirth, and parenting contexts.
Methods: This scoping review was conducted in accordance with the five-stage framework proposed by Arksey and O'Malley. PubMed and CINAHL Plus with Full Text were searched using indexed terms and Boolean operators to identify articles published from January 1949 to December 2025.
Results: Of 2668 records screened, 39 met inclusion criteria. The evidence base was dominated by case reports, with large-scale secondary analyses and qualitative studies emerging recently. Evidence was mapped across pregnancy, childbirth, and parenting. Pregnancy-related evidence included clinical changes and complications, prenatal assessment findings, and subjective pregnancy experiences. Childbirth-related evidence included delivery methods, anesthesia management, delivery characteristics and complications, postpartum strategies reported in case reports, post-delivery symptom changes, and subjective childbirth experiences. Parenting evidence was limited to subjective experiences describing adaptive caregiving strategies.
Conclusion: This review synthesizes 77 years of research on maternal health among women with spina bifida across pregnancy, childbirth, and parenting. The findings highlight clinical insights and evidence gaps, underscoring the need for condition-specific, life-course-oriented care and research addressing postpartum recovery, parenting, and women's physical, social, and psychological well-being.
期刊介绍：
Disability and Health Journal is a scientific, scholarly, and multidisciplinary journal for reporting original contributions that advance knowledge in disability and health. Topics may be related to global health, quality of life, and specific health conditions as they relate to disability. Such contributions include:
• Reports of empirical research on the characteristics of persons with disabilities, environment, health outcomes, and determinants of health
• Reports of empirical research on the Systematic or other evidence-based reviews and tightly conceived theoretical interpretations of research literature
• Reports of empirical research on the Evaluative research on new interventions, technologies, and programs
• Reports of empirical research on the Reports on issues or policies affecting the health and/or quality of life for persons with disabilities, using a scientific base.
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