Pregnant women's use of a consumer-based meditation mobile app: A descriptive study

The objectives of this study were to explore the satisfaction of pregnant or recently pregnant women with the existing Calm app content (i.e. non-pregnancy) and preferences and recommendations for the types of pregnancy-specific content that would be helpful to pregnant women.

This study was a national cross-sectional survey of subscribers to a meditation mobile app (i.e. Calm). Eligible participants were currently pregnant or recently pregnant (within the past 12 months) and used Calm during their pregnancy. Participants were asked about their Calm usage and perceived benefits of Calm during pregnancy, and interest in pregnancy-specific content. Descriptive statistics were used to characterize the sample.

Participants (N  =  111) were on average 34 years old (SD  =  5.4) and half of the sample was currently pregnant (N  =  55). The most common reasons for using the Calm app during pregnancy was for sleep problems (29%; n  =  31) or anxiety (27%; n  =  29). Women reported Calm was most helpful for improving sleep (32%; n  =  32), anxiety (25%; n  =  25), and stress (21%; n  =  21). Nearly all women wanted pregnancy-specific meditation content within the app (98%; n  =  98) and expressed interest in topics including pregnancy-related anxiety (68%; n  =  67), postpartum (50%; n  =  49), pregnancy-related sleep problems (41%; n  =  40), and labor and delivery (38%; n  =  37).

Women who used the Calm app during pregnancy found it helpful for improving sleep, anxiety, and stress but desire pregnancy-specific content. Future meditation mobile app studies should utilize pregnancy-specific content and test the feasibility and efficacy of sleep and mental health in pregnant women.