Women's Health and Maternity Care
Women's health and maternity care tests preconception advice, antenatal and postnatal care, contraception, cervical screening, menstrual disorders, menopause and common gynaecological presentations. The exam rewards risk assessment, safe prescribing and recognition of time-critical obstetric problems.
Core rules
- Preconception: folic acid, medication review, cervical screening status, blood pressure and diabetes optimisation.
- Antenatal danger signs include bleeding, severe headache, visual disturbance, epigastric pain, reduced fetal movements and fever; assess blood pressure and urine promptly.
- Contraception: use UKMEC/WHO eligibility; long-acting reversible methods are most effective; check migraine, thrombosis and smoking risk for combined pills.
- Cervical screening uses HPV testing with cytology triage in many programmes; follow local intervals.
- Menopause: HRT is individualised; review cardiovascular, breast and thromboembolic risk.
Worked example
A 30-year-old at 34 weeks has a severe headache and BP 150/100 mmHg. Repeat BP, check urine protein, bloods and fetal wellbeing, and refer urgently for pre-eclampsia assessment. Reasoning: hypertension plus neurological symptoms after 20 weeks is pre-eclampsia until proven otherwise.
Traps
Normalising severe headache in pregnancy; missing postnatal depression; prescribing combined hormonal contraception with migraine with aura; and treating abnormal uterine bleeding without checking pregnancy and cervical screening.