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Maternal Well-Being and Quality of Life During Pregnancy: Emerging Clinical Perspectives
This special issue belongs to the section “Obstetrics and Gynecology“.
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Pregnancy is a period of profound physiological, psychological, and behavioral change, during which maternal health plays a decisive role in both short- and long-term outcomes for the mother and fetus. Beyond traditional obstetric risk factors, growing evidence highlights the importance of psychological well-being, medical comorbidities, and lifestyle behaviors—such as alcohol and tobacco use—in shaping maternal quality of life and pregnancy outcomes.
This Special Issue aims to provide a comprehensive and multidisciplinary perspective on maternal health during pregnancy, integrating obstetric, psychological, and public health approaches. We particularly welcome studies that explore interactions among psychological distress, medical conditions, and lifestyle factors, and their impact on maternal functioning, health-related quality of life, and perinatal outcomes.
The submission of original research articles, systematic reviews, and well-documented clinical studies is invited. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, the following:
- Psychological distress, anxiety, depression, and stress during pregnancy;
- Medical comorbidities and chronic conditions in pregnant women;
- Health-related quality of life and functional outcomes in pregnancy;
- Alcohol, tobacco, and other lifestyle-related exposures during pregnancy;
- Screening tools and integrated assessment models in antenatal care;
- Psychosocial and behavioral determinants of obstetric outcomes;
- Multidisciplinary and preventive approaches in maternal–fetal medicine.
By bringing together clinical obstetrics, mental health research, and lifestyle medicine, this Special Issue aims to support more holistic, patient-centered approaches to prenatal care and to inform evidence-based strategies to improve maternal and perinatal health.
Dr. Elena Bernad
Guest Editor
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Medicina is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2200 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- maternal well-being
- pregnancy quality of life
- psychological distress in pregnancy
- antenatal mental health
- lifestyle factors during pregnancy
- alcohol and tobacco exposure
- perinatal outcomes
- integrated antenatal care
- patient-centred prenatal care
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