Birth and Beyond: A Qualitative, Codesigned Approach to a Simulation-based Antenatal Curriculum on Newborn Care

Most traditional antenatal programs are didactic, focusing primarily on labor and delivery, with limited emphasis on newborn care. New parents consequently feel nervous and ill-equipped to care for their newborn babies. This study describes the development, implementation, and pilot evaluation of a contextually relevant, simulation-based antenatal curriculum using a qualitative, codesign methodology involving parents and health care providers.

This qualitative curriculum development project was conducted at a tertiary care hospital in Chennai, India. Curriculum development was guided by Kern's Six-Step Approach. Semistructured interviews were conducted with expectant parents (n = 8), new parents (n = 6), and health care providers (n = 5), and analyzed using Braun and Clarke's 6-phase thematic analysis. The identified learning needs informed the "Birth and Beyond" curriculum, which was then piloted with 16 antenatal couples and evaluated using Kirkpatrick's 4-level model. The study was approved by the institutional review board.

Five themes emerged from qualitative analysis: antenatal newborn care education, experiential learning, feeding support, navigating conflicting advice, and the need for partner inclusion. Pilot participants reported satisfaction and reassurance (level 1), demonstrated practical skills during guided activities (level 2), and described applying aspects of their learning postnatally with active partner participation (level 3). Six-month follow-up identified high reported exclusive breastfeeding rates and few adverse infant health events (level 4); these observations were exploratory and not interpreted as evidence of curriculum effectiveness.

This codesigned, simulation-based "Birth and Beyond" curriculum represents a feasible, well-accepted approach to addressing gaps in practical newborn care preparation within antenatal education. The study illustrates a systematic approach to developing experiential parent education through stakeholder-informed curriculum design, while highlighting the need for further evaluation using larger samples and comparative designs.