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Metropolitan Maternity Services

Regional Maternity Services

Dr Rhonda Small

BA (Melb) Dip Ed (La Trobe) Grad Dip Lib (RMIT) Grad Dip Epid (Melb) PhD (La Trobe)

Associate Professor and Acting Director

Email: r.small@latrobe.edu.au

Telephone: 03 8341 8542

Rhonda has worked at MCHR since 1991. She has been involved in a major research program on maternal depression, ranging from descriptive studies on prevalence and women's experiences of depression, to three randomised trials of interventions to improve women's emotional wellbeing after birth. Her PhD investigated maternity care experiences and postnatal health of Vietnamese, Turkish and Filipino women in Melbourne and her current research is focused on analyses of routine perinatal data investigating country of birth variations in obstetric outcomes. She is Co-Leader (with A/Prof Anita Gagnon) of the international perinatal research collaboration: ROAM - Reproductive Outcomes And Migration, working with perinatal researchers across Europe and Canada. Other areas of work include being a lead investigator with COMPASS, an NHMRC capacity building grant in public health research and a chief investigator with Angela Taft in research studies to improve maternal health in the context of intimate partner violence.

MAJOR RESEARCH INTERESTS

Research interests include women's views and experiences of maternity care, cross-cultural issues in perinatal research, maternal depression, women's health and intimate partner violence and maternal health and recovery following operative birth.

CURRENT PROJECTS

Improving maternity care and obstetric outcomes for immigrant women
Team:	In collaboration with the Victorian Perinatal Data Collection Unit and the NSW Midwives' Data Collection
Funding:	NHMRC Career Development Award
Status:	Ongoing; one paper published

International comparisons of the perinatal health and care of migrant women
Team:	Anita Gagnon (McGill University, Montreal) and co-applicants Maureen Heaman (University of Manitoba), Rhonda Small (MCHR), Donna Stewart (University of Toronto) and Militza Zencovich (Citizenship and Immigration Canada)
Funding:	Canadian Institutes of Health Research International Opportunities Program Collaborative Research Grant, 2006-2008
Status:	Three papers published ; two submitted

Improving maternal and child health care for women experiencing violence: collaborative development, implementation and effectiveness of a good practice model
Team:	Angela Taft, Rhonda Small, Cathy Humphreys, Kelsey Hegarty, Judith Lumley
Funding:	ARC Linkage Grant, 2008-2011
Status:	Ethics approval obtained; implementation underway

South Asian women’s experiences of living with gestational diabetes mellitus
Team:	Mridula Bandyopadhyay, Rhonda Small, Jeremy Oats, Della Forster, Amanda Aylward
Funding:	LaTrobe Faculty of Health Sciences Grant 2009
Status:	Ethics approval obtained, recruitment and interviewing underway

MOSAIC: Mothers' Advocates In the Community: a cluster randomised trial
Team:	Angela Taft, Rhonda Small, Kelsey Hegarty, Judith Lumley, Lyn Watson
Funding:	NHMRC project grant 2005-2007; Department of Victorian Communities - Community Support grant 2006-2008; VicHealth Public Health Fellowship (AT) 2006-2010; Telstra Community Development Fund; Victorian Community Council against Violence, Commonwealth Department of Family and Community Services
Status:	Trial implementation complete; two papers published

The experience of postnatal depression in a rural Australian community
Team:	Sue Armstrong and Rhonda Small
Funding:	La Trobe University Postgraduate Research Scholarship 2007-2008, Diamond Consortium Seed Grant 2006-2007
Status:	One paper published; data collection complete; analysis and writing up ongoing

The experience of maternity care and depression after birth among women from Iran and Afghanistan in Melbourne
Team:	Rhonda Small, Helen McLachlan, Touran Shafiei
Funding:	PhD scholarship; Diamond Consortium Seed and Capacity Building Grant
Status:	Telephone and face-to-face interviews completed, analysis complete, thesis write up underway

HARP: Health And Recovery after operative birth Project
Team:	Rhonda Small, Judith Lumley, Maggie Flood, Michelle Kealy, Liesje Toomey
Funding:	NHMRC project grant 2001-2003
Status:	Two papers published

PRISM – Program of Resources, Information and Support for Mothers: A community randomised trial
Team:	Judith Lumley, Rhonda Small, Lyn Watson, Stephanie Brown, Creina Mitchell, Jane Gunn
Funding:	NHMRC 1997-2001 & 2002-2004, VicHealth grants for program resources and implementation 1998-2000, Victorian Department of Human Services Program Implementation grants 1998-2000, Felton Bequest grant 1998, Sydney Myer Fund grant 1999, beyondblue grant 2002, and participating municipalities' contributions to program implementation and data collection
Status:	Four papers published, two year follow-up data analysed; paper in preperation

PUBLICATIONS (Selected)

Gissler M, Alexander S, Macfarlane A, Small R, Stray-Pedersen B, Zeitlin J, Zimbeck M, Gagnon AJ. Still births and infant deaths among migrants in industrialised countries. Acta Obstet Gynecol Scand 1009;88:134-148

Small R, Gagnon A, Gissler M, Zeitlin J, Bennis M, Glazier R, Haelterman E, Martens G, McDermott S, Urquia M, Vangen S. Somali women and their pregnancy outcomes post-migration: data from six receiving countries BJOG 2008; 115:1630-40.

Taft A, Small R, Hoang K. Intimate partner violence in Vietnam and among Vietnamese diaspora communities in western societies: a comprehensive review. J Fam Studies 2008;14:167-182.

Aghlmand S, Akbari F, Lameei A, Mohammad K, Small R, Arab M. Developing evidence-based maternity care in Iran: a quality improvement study. BMC Pregnancy Childbirth 2008;8:20

Bastos MHS, Bick D, Rowan CJ, Small R, Mckenzie-Mcharg K. Debriefing for the prevention of psychological trauma in women following childbirth. (Protocol) Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2008, Issue 2. Art. No: CD007194. DOI:10.1002/14651858.CD007194

Flood M, Small R. Researching labour and birth events using health information records: methodological challenges Midwifery 2008 March 3 [Epub ahead of print]

Small R, Lumley J. Reduction of maternal depression: much remains to be done. Lancet 2007;370:1593-5.[Invited commentary]

Small R, Lumley J, Yelland J, Brown S. The performance of the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale in English speaking and non-English speaking populations in Australia. Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol 2007;42:70-78.

Daly J, Willis K, Small R, Green J, Welch N, Kealy M, Hughes E. Assessing qualitative research in health: a hierarchy of evidence-for-practice. J Clin Epidemiol 2007;60:43-49.

Armstrong S, Small R. Screening for postnatal depression: not a simple task. Aust N Z J Public Health 2007;31:57-61.

Small R, Lumley J, Toomey L. Midwife-led debriefing after operative birth: four to six year follow-up of a randomised trial [ISRCTN24628614]. BMC Medicine 2006;4:3.

Lumley J, Watson L, Small R, Brown S, Mitchell C, Gunn J PRISM (Program of Resources Information and Support for Mothers): a community randomised trial to reduce depression and improve women's physical health six months after birth [ISRCTNO3464021]. BMC Public Health 2006;6:37.

Small R, Brown S, Dawson W, Watson L, Lumley J. Mounting a community-randomised trial. Establishing partnerships with local government. Aust N Z J Public Health 2004;28:471-475.

Small R, Lumley J, Yelland J. Cross-cultural experiences of maternal depression: associations and contributing factors for Vietnamese, Turkish and Filipino immigrant women in Victoria, Australia. Ethnicity Health 2003;8:189-206.

Small R, Yelland J, Lumley J, Brown S, Liamputtong P. Immigrant Women's views about care during labor and birth: an Australian study of Vietnamese, Turkish and Filipino women. Birth 2002;29:266-277.

Small R, Lumley J, Donohue L, Potter A, Waldenström U. Randomised controlled trial of midwife led debriefing to reduce maternal depression after operative childbirth. Br Med J 2000; 321:1043-7.

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Content Approved by: Director, Mother and Child Health Research
Page maintained by: Administrator
Last Updated: 26 August 2007