On May 22, World Preeclampsia Day was commemorated to raise awareness about this serious pregnancy complication, affecting between 5% and 8% of pregnancies globally. The AFIN Research Group, as part of the RICORS-SAMID network of maternal and child health research centers in Spain, joined the events under the project Primary care interventions to prevent maternal and child chronic diseases of perinatal and developmental origin (RD21/0012/0018, Ministry of Science and Innovation).
Within WP12, led by Prof. Diana Marre (Promoting a personalised and family-centred maternal and infant primary healthcare: improving shared decision-making, gender and ethnic-sensitive approaches and digital tools), AFIN Barcelona (UAB) provides a sociocultural perspective on pregnancy and childbirth, with a focus on risk situations such as preeclampsia and related cardiovascular conditions.
Through ethnographic fieldwork—interviews and participant observation—a team of anthropologists studied the experiences of patients with preeclampsia and the professionals who accompany them (2022–2023, Hospital de la Santa Creu i Sant Pau, Barcelona; 2023, HCU Virgen de la Arrixaca, Murcia). This approach generates knowledge applicable to improving care and designing tools sensitive to the patients’ sociocultural contexts.
Some of the resulting outputs and presentations can be found in this downloadable infographic: