Research has highlighted a consistent lack of understanding around being active during pregnancy amongst both health professionals and the general public. Long-standing social norms such as ‘put your feet up and rest’ has led to pregnant women were being ill-advised during their pregnancies.
Challenge
There was an appetite in Sefton for a marketing campaign to dispel the myths, plus tackle the problem of pregnant women being overweight and obese.
It needed to highlight that maintaining physical activity throughout pregnancy is much more important than helping women ‘get back into shape’ and that it’s important to the overall health of pregnant women.
Merseyside Sport Support
- Launching the Befit4baby campaign to encourage pregnant women to become more physically active ‘Before, Bump, Birth & Beyond’, with local, active pregnant women as the ‘face’ of the campaign.
- Devising a new training programme to educate health professionals working with pregnant women and develop their understanding in terms of: what they understood about pregnancy and PA, what exercises were safe and the key messages that should be advocated to pregnant women during their pregnancy. Plus developing the Befit4baby NHS lifestyle cards
- Providing community sessions of ante-and postnatal activity to pregnant women.
- Creating a series of social marketing posters promoting key health messages to change people’s attitudes and perceptions towards women being active during pregnancy.
- Produced a ‘Mums’ Magazine’ for pregnant women to raise awareness and understanding of pregnancy and PA.
The Active Difference
18 different sites across Sefton were targeted with the Befit4baby promotional campaign posters.
Two yoga sessions were delivered with a total of 65 pregnant women attending sessions delivered. Plus, the Befit4baby Pregnancy & Physical Activity Awareness Training reached 21 Family Development Workers, 60 Health Visitors, 12 Liverpool Community Health Smoking Cessation team, 1 Active Walk Co-ordinator , 7 Food & Health Workers and 63 Midwives, all of whom took the campaign messages to women of child bearing age (16-44 years) in Sefton.