Stakeholder engagement
The OptiBreech Trial research team have facilitated involvement of
multiple stakeholders from the start of the project
(https://optibreech.uk/category/ppi/). The project grew out of a
body of evidence indicating that women who wished to plan a VBB do not
always feel that services meet their needs. There was a need to identify
a more effective model of service delivery, in collaboration with
service users. Due to concerns about low recruitment in previous breech
trials, it was a priority that our method of testing be acceptable to
women currently using maternity services and the staff that provide
them. Additionally, while they valued accurate effectiveness and safety
data, users favoured the development of a model of care that reliably
supports informed decision-making and the autonomy of the birthing
person, rather than a model that promoted either CS, VBB or external
cephalic version (ECV) as the ‘best’ option. Stakeholder engagement in
analysis and interpretation was facilitated through regular online
meetings with the study Patient and Public Involvement group. These were
advertised by email to participants, the OptiBreech website and blog,
and relevant social media channels.