Hayward, PennyBidois-Putt, MCKercher, Amy JaneMcColl, CarrieFahey, NDonkin, Liesje2025-03-032025-03-032025BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth, ISSN: 1471-2393 (Print); 1471-2393 (Online), BMC, 25(1), 186-. doi: 10.1186/s12884-024-07008-71471-23931471-2393http://hdl.handle.net/10292/18793BACKGROUND: For many women, having a baby is one of the most exciting and rewarding experiences; however, not everyone experiences the same positivity and pleasure when pregnant or having a new baby. For some, the ongoing hormonal and physical changes, mood swings, and personal and familial situations can create a lonely experience that can lead to distress and mental health issues. Wāhine Māori (Māori women) experience greater rates of postnatal distress (PND) and are less likely to seek help than women of European descent. Screening for PND could help identify those at risk of developing mental health issues or distress before it escalates. However, it is unclear how often Māori mothers are screened, or what their experiences of screening are. METHOD: Using a Māori-centred approach, we explored the experience of wāhine Māori of mental health screening during the perinatal period. RESULTS: Eleven wāhine Māori were interviewed about their experiences, with transcripts analysed using thematic analysis. Four themes and 12 subthemes were found in the data. Participants reported feeling a lack of relationship with their midwives, experiencing inconsistent care, lacking trust, that their views were unimportant, fearing judgment, concerns about losing their children to authorities if they disclosed mood issues and a lack of culturally appropriate care. CONCLUSIONS: There was an overall sense of inadequate screening support for mental health concerns among Māori mothers in Aotearoa New Zealand. These results indicate the need for more culturally appropriate screening tools and a genuinely holistic approach to perinatal services encompassing a more whānau-centred approach to maternal care.Open Access. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, which permits any non-commercial use, sharing, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if you modified the licensed material. You do not have permission under this licence to share adapted material derived from this article or parts of it. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/.https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/Early detectionIndigenousMental healthMāoriPerinatal distressPostnatal depressionScreening4203 Health Services and Systems4204 Midwifery4205 Nursing42 Health SciencesPediatricMental IllnessClinical ResearchPreventionMental HealthHealth ServicesBehavioral and Social ScienceMental healthReproductive health and childbirth3 Good Health and Well Being1110 Nursing1114 Paediatrics and Reproductive Medicine1117 Public Health and Health ServicesObstetrics & Reproductive Medicine3215 Reproductive medicine4204 MidwiferyAdultFemaleHumansPregnancyYoung AdultMaori PeopleMass ScreeningMental HealthMothersNew ZealandPerinatal CareQualitative ResearchHumansMass ScreeningPerinatal CareMothersMental HealthPregnancyQualitative ResearchAdultNew ZealandFemaleYoung AdultMaori PeopleHumansFemaleNew ZealandQualitative ResearchPregnancyAdultNative Hawaiian or Pacific IslanderPerinatal CareMental HealthMass ScreeningMothersYoung AdultMaori PeopleJournal ArticleOpenAccess10.1186/s12884-024-07008-7