Women doctors face considerable challenges navigating family planning, pregnancy and motherhood. Their experiences can have relevance for health system functioning, including doctor retention. This scoping review synthesises research on family planning, fertility, pregnancy and motherhood among women doctors in the EU and the UK.

Scoping review conducted according to JBI best practice guidance.

MEDLINE, CINAHL, Academic Search Complete, PsycInfo and Web of Science were searched, and supplemented with backwards and forwards citation chasing.

Peer-reviewed, original research, in English, focusing on either fertility and family planning, pregnancy and/or motherhood among women doctors in an EU country(s) and/or the UK.

Data were extracted independently by two authors. Data were synthesised using deductive content analysis and collated using narrative synthesis.

In total, 34 studies were identified. Family planning appears complicated by medical careers. Medical specialty choice is particularly impacted, with certain specialties (eg, General Practice) considered particularly family friendly and others markedly less so. Pregnancy complications among women doctors, especially surgeons, were documented. However, women doctors’ and non-doctors’ pregnancy outcomes were overall not significantly different. Notably, doctor-mothers had fewer children and were more likely to report making compromises or facing negative consequences when balancing family and career than doctor-fathers.

Women doctors in the EU and UK report challenges in balancing work and motherhood. With the potential for their experiences to impact on health system functioning and patient outcomes, training bodies and health organisations should take proactive action to better support women doctors and ensure they can remain in the profession and practice in their desired specialty. Future research examining working practices/schedules during pregnancy, breastfeeding experiences, parenting and childcare and maternal mental health will support a better understanding of women doctors’ experiences and facilitate implementation of effective supports.

To explore and understand the disease priorities and preferences for rapid diagnostic testings (RDTs) among community members and stakeholders.

Qualitative study using focused group discussions and in-depth interviews. Thematic analysis was applied to identify themes of disease priorities and RDT preferences.

uMsunduzi Municipality, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.

49 community members and five community stakeholders were recruited through a combination of convenience and purposeful sampling using community events and meetings.

Participants prioritised both communicable diseases (HIV, tuberculosis) and non-communicable diseases (diabetes, cardiovascular disease, hypertension and cancer), aligning with national health priorities. They supported RDTs for early diagnosis and home-based testing to mitigate barriers to accessing diagnostic care. A need for post-test support, such as digital support tools, was also highlighted.

Community perspectives highlighted a demand for accessible, rapid and decentralised diagnostic tools for high-burden diseases in KwaZulu-Natal. RDTs have the potential to improve health outcomes and reduce health disparities through improved access to diagnostic healthcare services. The community members are potential end users of RDTs, especially in resource-constrained settings. Therefore, their perspectives should be considered in the development and implementation of RDTs to enhance acceptability and public health impact.

Economic evaluations in healthcare can guide practice and inform policy. The objective of this paper is to present the protocol for a health economic evaluation comparing the cost-effectiveness of prophylactic treatment using pantoprazole 40 mg daily compared with no pantoprazole to prevent upper gastrointestinal (GI) bleed among invasively ventilated patients.

This is an economic evaluation conducted alongside the Re-Evaluating the Inhibition of Stress Erosions (REVISE) trial (ClinicalTrials.gov NCT03374800). The primary outcome is the incremental cost per clinically important upper GI bleed prevented. The base-case analysis will focus on the entire international cohort of 4821 REVISE patients. The analysis will be conducted from a healthcare payer perspective over a time horizon of ICU admission to hospital discharge or death. To facilitate comparisons across countries given the international scope of the REVISE trial, costs will be presented in United States dollars. The study protocol was developed following the Professional Society for Health Economics and Outcomes Research guidelines.

The trial was approved by each participating institution; this economic evaluation was approved by the Hamilton Integrated Research Ethics Board. Given widespread daily use of proton pump inhibitors for critically ill patients, the results of this economic evaluation will be of high relevance to patients, family members, physicians, pharmacists, policymakers and guideline developers. Integrated knowledge translation will involve periodic progress reports to collaborators. End-of-study knowledge translation will include rounds, videoconferences, abstracts and slide-decks for intensive care unit quality councils and healthcare organisations, and open-access publications. Patient and family partners will co-create lay language summaries for traditional and social media to help inform all interest groups.

Cleft lip and/or palate (CL/P) is a lifelong condition affecting one in 700 births. In the UK, individuals born with CL/P follow a care pathway at specialist regional cleft centres, which includes input from a range of professionals including surgeons, speech and language therapists, cleft specialist nurses, orthodontists, dentists and clinical psychologists. The cleft centres provide care from diagnosis to early adulthood. Individuals born with CL/P are typically discharged from routine care at their cleft centre between the ages of 15 and 25 years.

Outcome measures of cleft care are currently gathered at different timepoints across the treatment pathway nationally and include outcomes for speech, growth, dental health and psychosocial well-being. However, there is no consistent reporting of outcomes for young adults when they complete routine care, meaning we do not know whether variation in outcomes exists and what this might look like.

This research programme will investigate whether outcomes vary based on factors such as geographical location, biological sex, socioeconomic status or ethnicity. By understanding how outcomes might vary, and the scale and type of variation, we plan to work with young adults born with CL/P and specialist clinicians to develop ways to ensure that everyone born with CL/P in the UK receives the optimum care to meet their needs.

Cleft@18–23 is an observational study of young adults born with CL/P. Recruitment is planned across all regions of the UK, beginning in April 2025 with research clinics scheduled to run between June 2025 and May 2027. The recruitment target is 640 participants born with CL/P. Participants with all cleft diagnoses, including those with additional syndromic diagnoses, will be eligible for recruitment. We will recruit participants from all ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds. Data collection will include self-report participant questionnaires, speech samples, a hearing screen, two-dimensional and three-dimensional medical photographs, an intraoral scan and a dental assessment. A range of descriptive and inferential statistical analyses will explore variation in outcomes across different groups.

The Cleft@18–23 study obtained ethical approval from the South West-Frenchay Research Ethics Committee on 26 November 2024 (REC reference: 24/SW/0128). Informed consent will be required for participation. Findings from the Cleft@18–23 study will be disseminated through peer-reviewed publications, conference presentations, newsletters, the study website (https://www.bristol.ac.uk/cleft18-23) and social media.

ISRCTN34027276.