THE ROLE OF THE NURSES IN HUMANIZED CHILDBIRTH CARE IN HOSPITAL ENVIRONMENTS

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: Pregnancy is a very significant period in the lives of many women, as it involves physical, physiological, social and emotional changes, requiring care to ensure the health and well-being of mother and baby. Labor is the most important physiological process during the gestation period, and can generate anxiety and doubt in the parturient between vaginal delivery and cesarean section. This happens because women associate natural childbirth with a painful and difficult moment. However, obstetric nurses seek to change this perspective, bringing humanized and welcoming care to the moment of childbirth, based on good practices during birth and encouraging childbirth to occur naturally and without unnecessary interventions, since it is a unique moment in a woman's life. Given this, "what is the role of the nurse in humanized childbirth care in hospital settings?" METHODOLOGY: the type of research chosen for this study was an integrative literature review, which was guided by the question: "what is the role of the nurse in humanized childbirth care in hospital settings?" The bibliographic search was conducted in the BVS in the databases: LILACS, MEDLINE, BDENF. The search terms were the DeCS: “humanized childbirth” “obstetric nursing” “childbirth care”, combined with the Boolean operator AND. The inclusion criteria for selecting the studies were: availability of the full text in Portuguese, English and Spanish, with publications in the last five years and accessible online; theses, monographs and works that did not meet the proposed objectives were excluded. After identification and completion of the search, the abstracts of the included articles were analyzed and read, then the data were organized in tables and charts and discussed. RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS: the obstetric nurse plays an essential role in the humanization of childbirth, offering emotional support, pain relief and promoting the protagonism of the pregnant woman, providing a safer, more welcoming and respectful experience. However, there are still challenges that hinder the full implementation of this care, such as the resistance of multidisciplinary teams and the persistence of unnecessary intervention practices. CONCLUSION: It is concluded that the obstetric nurse plays a fundamental role in the humanization of childbirth, promoting welcoming, safe and centered care for the parturient, contributing to a positive and respectful experience.