If one had to choose a word to define what motivates her, it would probably be passion. That is Ana Paula Prata, a researcher at CINTESIS – Center for Health Technology and Services Research and coordinating professor at the Nursing School of Porto (ESEP). She is passionate about life, the one that is formed inside the womb, the one that is born and grows, that generates and gives birth, often groping its way in the dark. She is passionate about doing what has not yet been done, dreaming and making it happen. In her hands, she has a disruptive project that aims to adopt alternative models for the follow-up of pregnant women and families and the implementation of Maternity Care Units (MCU) as part of the Portuguese National Health Service (NHS), in the name of women’s rights and with the required scientific evidence. And she wants to do this at a time when obstetric emergencies suffer from a lack of professionals and the closure of delivery blocks.

Ana Paula Prata was born 59 years ago, prematurely, and at home, in Porto. She has always studied in Porto, living through the turbulent times of the post-April 25. In her childhood games, she was always the nurse. “I wanted to treat people and help babies to be born,” she recalls. In 12th grade, she had to choose between Nursing and Economics, another of her passions. In 1985, she finished the General Nursing Course at the Franciscan Missionary Sisters of Nossa Senhora School of Nursing (currently the Santa Maria School of Health), with a scholarship that required her to work in the outer areas of the city. So, in January 1986, she went to the Hospital of Paredes. “There was a great lack of nurses. We worked long hours, I was still single. It was a very interesting experience. I was in Obstetrics and had the opportunity to open an infant unit,” she recalls.

In August of the same year, she went to work at the São João Hospital (now University Hospital Center of São João – UHCSJ), but in Neurology, where she stayed for seven years. “It was one of the places where I learned the most. We worked together. We had a fabulous relationship. It was there that I could proudly say I was a nurse. We worked with few resources, but with passion,” she recalls.

In 1992, her love for Obstetrics spoke louder and she left the hospital to do a specialization in the predecessor of the Nursing School of Porto (ESEP). “I loved it. It was just what I wanted”, she confesses. She returned to the Hospital of São João, but to the Obstetrics Department, where a new challenge awaited her: “I was lucky enough to work with fantastic people who taught me a lot. However, a health problem forced me to leave the delivery room,” she recalls.

In October 1996, she accepted the invitation to join the ESEP to teach, something she had never thought of doing. “It was a difficult decision. I was going to jump into the unknown. I had dreamed of being many things, except a professor. I was very shy. I still am, in fact. But it went very well,” she rejoices.

At the same time, she fulfilled another of her dreams and entered the Master’s in Health Economics and Management at the Faculty of Economics of the University of Coimbra, which she completed in 2001. She completed her PhD in Nursing in 2016 at the Institute of Health Sciences of the Catholic University of Portugal, and then joined the CINTESIS research team as an integrated researcher.

Currently, she dedicates her life to teaching and research. Within CINTESIS and its research group NursID – Innovation and Development in Nursing, she has studied the construction of confidence for childbirth, which was shaken by the COVID-19 pandemic (see news), as well as the policies and intervention programs and assistance to pregnant women in Portugal and in health systems of different countries. She coordinates the project “Born in Portugal: a right to choose” for the adoption of alternative models for the follow-up of pregnant women at a national level. One of the goals is to develop Maternity Care Units (MCUs) integrated into the NHS and increase the number of natural, non-instrumented deliveries and the range of choices for women.

“Confidence in childbirth has been a concern of mine for many years. When I completed my PhD, I was very amazed that women thought they were not capable of giving birth and didn’t even have the perception that they could make decisions regarding their birth,” she emphasizes.

As for the MCUs, she argues that “an emergency room should be for an illness situation where only obstetricians can respond”, but argues that “there are many situations that are not true emergencies. A woman in labor is not an emergency. We believe that, with these Units, we will be able to increase the number of natural, non-instrumented births, which represent more than half of all births, and that we will give women equal access to the birth they wish to have. There are always women who will want C-sections. What we want is to increase the range of choices, with quality and safety,” she concludes.

1-Year Ambition

I hope to see the completion of the economic evaluation study of MCU in pregnancy, with my doctoral student and CINTESIS researcher Andreia Gonçalves. Then we will have another study on the economic evaluation of childbirth. We are also working with the Portuguese Association of Obstetric Nurses to present this project to official entities. I hope that the MCUs will soon have a pilot project.

10-Year Ambition

I would like my footprint on earth to be beyond my children. I want to contribute to building a reality in which women have the right to choose, become active participants in their labor, and have a more positive birth experience. I would also like that maternal health and obstetric nurses would become more significant in this journey. This way we would be giving birth back to women and promoting equity and sustainability of the Portuguese National Health System.

Life Beyond Research

I really enjoy walking around Porto, I love to read, and I have a great fascination for comics. I love “Harry Potter”, “The Lord of the Rings” and Marvel movies. In the future, when I retire, I will take a course in Nanotechnology [laughs].