Research centres
Centre for Maternal and Child Health Research
  1. The Cherish Project
  2. Infant Mental Health
  3. Pregnancy and Parenting Circles
  1. Current projects
Maternal and Child Health

Current projects

Implementation of observational mother-infant interaction tools within specialist Perinatal Mental Health Services.

As part of a NIHR funded doctoral clinical academic fellowship, Kyla Vaillancourt is conducting research to inform the implementation of observational measures of parent-infant interaction in specialist perinatal mental health services. The research aims to generate evidence about how to make an observational measure feasible and acceptable to implement in perinatal services and will result in recommendations for services to guide clinical care.

This research is supported by a Clinical Advisory Group and Patient and Public Involvement Group.

The research involves 3 related work packages:

Work Package 1

Will test the reliability and validity of a briefer and digital version of the NICHD parent-infant interaction scales which, if effective, could offer a feasible alternative to existing observational measures which are intensive to train in and administer.

Work Package 2

Will determine the acceptability of using observational measures of parent-infant interaction as part of clinical care from the perspective of parents and their family members.

Work Package 3

Will evaluate the feasibility of implementing an observational measure of parent-infant interaction in specialist perinatal mental health services considering clinical and organisational factors specific to the specialist perinatal mental health setting.