How do we measure “well-being”?

Interviews are ongoing! I’m just relishing in hearing what perinatal OT’s do! It’s just so vast… our capacity to offer holistic services to this unique population is nothing short of impressive. It’s becoming clearer to me how much scope there is for OT’s to exercise their full scope of practice potential in maternal health. It’s simply enormous!
Today’s interview made me really reflect on how we measure ‘well-being’. We know it’s important, but how do we measure it to validate and justify our practice?? Then I was pointed in the direction of this really interesting journal article by Ingvild Aune, Unn Dahlberg, and Gørill Haugan, published in Sexual & Reproductive Healthcare (2016), 8; 6–12. It’s has offered me even more food for thought…
The abstract reads:
“Salutogenesis focuses on identifying the causes of health rather than the causes of illness, and in this way offers a health promotion framework for maternity services. The application of salutogenesis theory in empirical studies of healthy women in maternity care appears to be rare, and mostly incomplete. The objective of this study is to examine the psychometric properties of the Orientation to Life Questionnaire (OLQ) assessing sense of coherence (SOC) in a population of healthy Norwegian women during the postnatal period”
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/286239274_Sense_of_coherence_among_healthy_Norwegian_women_in_postnatal_care_Dimensionality_reliability_and_construct_validity_of_the_Orientation_to_Life_Questionnaire?actorId=3313136
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Author: Dr Hannah Slootjes (PhD)

I'm an occupational therapist, women's health researcher, academic, writer, mum, and passionate life learner. In 2022, I completed PhD exploring how OTs globally do, could or should work to promote health and maintain wellbeing for mothers during and after pregnancy, and matrescence. Titled, 'The Role of Occupational Therapists in Perinatal Health' my thesis introduced the Person-centered Occupational Model of Matrescence (POMM) to understand women's wellbeing from a human-centered approach, and the Functional Co-occupation Spectrum (FCS) for working with mother-infant dyads. I am currently teaching occupational therapy and public health students at La Trobe University, and writing a textbook about working with women during perinatal stages and matrescence based on my thesis (aiming for publication in 2024). I still love clinical practice, and work in women's health locally in Bendigo. After taking a year-long sabbatical to recover and re-energise after completing my PhD, I'm rolling up my sleeves and gearing up for the next life chapter! I'm still writing and teaching, and will be increasing practice-based supports for OTs from this website from May 2023. I am so looking forward to reconnecting with OTs practicing and researching in this space, and cannot wait to be part of the next phase of practice-based professional development!

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