Stakeholder engagement
The OptiBreech Trial research team have facilitated involvement of multiple stakeholders from the start of the project (https://optibreech.uk/category/ppi/). The project grew out of a body of evidence indicating that women who wished to plan a VBB do not always feel that services meet their needs. There was a need to identify a more effective model of service delivery, in collaboration with service users. Due to concerns about low recruitment in previous breech trials, it was a priority that our method of testing be acceptable to women currently using maternity services and the staff that provide them. Additionally, while they valued accurate effectiveness and safety data, users favoured the development of a model of care that reliably supports informed decision-making and the autonomy of the birthing person, rather than a model that promoted either CS, VBB or external cephalic version (ECV) as the ‘best’ option. Stakeholder engagement in analysis and interpretation was facilitated through regular online meetings with the study Patient and Public Involvement group. These were advertised by email to participants, the OptiBreech website and blog, and relevant social media channels.