This paper will discuss risk status assessment and its role in midwifery. Included in the discussion will be how risk assessment fits into a birth center setting, and how explaining the concept of risk assessment to a client would take place.
Risk status assessment is an important part of the primary prevention of disease or negative outcome. Negative outcomes are avoided by reducing or altering susceptibility of risks. Secondary prevention of outcomes includes early detection and treatment, also through risk assessment. Tertiary prevention includes the alleviation of problems with the promotion of health, as much as possible within the disease state. Thus risk assessment is an important part of educating and caring for the patient (Murphy, p. 67).
Formal assessment tools are developed, based on risk factors that are known. For example, lack of a high school education is a risk factor that has been associated with an adverse outcome. Risk factors associated with negative outcomes for pregnant women, include lack of education, race, age, marital status, and levels of prenatal care. Black women that are 40 years of older are six times more likely to die from pregnancy than the same age white woman. The screening technique used with pregnant women is designed to assess for these and other risk factors (Danel, Berg, & Atrash, 1998, p. 20; Murphy, p. 67).
Although risk assessment is important, there are also negative consequences if it takes place without care. For example, formal assessment can lead to risk labels being assigned, which can result in a loss of self-confidence. Not all risk factors do lead to adverse outcomes, and labeling can also result in medical interventions that are unnecessary and problematic. Screening tools must be accurate and they must avoid these concerns, however, the benefits of prenatal risk assessment are obvious, and this process is necessary for the midwife. Possible pregnancy and ...