Taking a patient-oriented approach in exercise interventions for pregnant women: a commentary

Taking a patient-oriented approach to developing lifestyle interventions includes incorporating the patient into the program's design, delivery, and evaluation. This commentary assumes that a patient-oriented approach has not yet been implemented and tested in exercise-based interventions designed for pregnant women. We outline and define a patient-oriented approach to conduct exercise-based research and review previous physical activity interventions designed for pregnant women to determine whether a patient-oriented approach was applied. In addition, pregnant women living with obesity may have unique barriers to engaging in prenatal exercise interventions that have not been previously addressed, such as having experienced weight stigma before pregnancy in healthcare and fitness settings. We propose suggestions for future trials to effectively take a patient-oriented approach when designing and implementing prenatal exercise interventions to address patient-informed barriers and incorporate suggested facilitators for physical activity. Given that prenatal activity levels are low and pregnant women may have unique barriers to engaging in exercise interventions, a patient-oriented approach may be an effective strategy to improve inclusivity and equity and, as a result, increase uptake and adherence to the intervention.