ABSTRACT
The appraisal of the literature of quality of life and well-being presents fundamental challenges in the application of these concepts to maternal and perinatal health. This chapter reveals that quality of life can be reliably assessed by questionnaire measures and many generic quality of life measures have been applied to the maternal and perinatal health arena. The notion of maternal and perinatal well-being represents a more diffuse concept than quality of life and this is seen in the literature, both in terms of the maturity of conceptual exposition, and the general lack of robust and conceptually congruent measures of the concept of well-being. Identifying and considering the dimensions relevant to perinatal well-being are essential in moving toward a better understanding of the concept. A mixed-method approach to instrument design could be considered the most suitable approach, capturing the relevant qualitative and quantitative threads implicit to the successful development of a 'condition-specific' and psychometrically robust measurement tool.
