Health Care : Current Reviews

Perinatal sexuality: An overview of womenâ??s intimacy and sexuality during and after pregnancy

Global Healthcare & Fitness Summit

July 20-22, 2015 San Francisco, USA

Catherine de Pierrepont

Keynote: Health Care: Current Reviews

Abstract:

In the transition to parenthood (from the decision to have a child or conception until the baby is 2 years old), future and
new parenting couples are faced with numerous intimate and sexual changes and have to adapt as best as they can. Women’s
sexuality change at different levels (biological, psychological, sociological, emotional) during the 5 phases of the perinatal
period: Preconception, pregnancy, childbirth, postpartum and breastfeeding. However, very little attention has been given to
women’s intimacy and sexuality during the transition to parenthood both in research and practice. Moreover, there is a clear
dearth of research and interventions in this domain, despite women’s obvious and particular needs. This presentation has
three objectives: Provide a critical review of the research studies conducted on this subject (what do we know on perinatal
sexuality concerning women?); provide an overview of the interventions developed to support women (what are we doing
to help those women?) and make recommendations for different levels of healthcare (what can we do as health professionals
for those women?). This presentation will provide a better understanding of a sexual fundamental issue for women: Perinatal
sexuality. It is part of an equity approach in population health to promote the individual, the couple, the family and the society
and to promote equitable access to appropriate services and collaborative, continuous and durable care regarding sexual and
reproductive health.

Biography :

Catherine de Pierrepont is a Sexologist (BA and MA from University of Quebec in Montreal) and she is presently a PhD Candidate in Population Health at the
University of Ottawa. As a Perinatal Sexologist, her research interests focus on perinatal sexuality during the transition to parenthood i.e., intimacy and sexuality of
future and new parenting couples during and after the pregnancy. Her PhD thesis is a multidimensional evaluation of francophone parenting couples’ sexoperinatal
experience living in a minority linguistic context in Ottawa and Eastern Ontario.