Objective: To use an intersectional approach to analyze women's reflections on how their migration and resettlement experiences to Sweden influenced their health and healthcare needs during childbearing. Methods: Focus-group discussions, pair interviews and individual interviews were conducted in southern Sweden between 2006 and 2009, with 25 women originating from 17 different countries with heterogeneous backgrounds that had experienced childbirth in Sweden. Qualitative content analysis was used with an intersectional approach, taking into consideration intersections of ethnicity, socio-economic status (SES) and gender. Findings: The hardships of migration, resettlement, and constraints in the daily life made the women feel overstrained, tense, and disembodied. Being treated as a stranger and ignored or rejected in healthcare encounters was devaluing and discriminating. The women stressed that they felt stronger and had fewer complications during pregnancy and labor when they were "taken seriously" and felt that they had a confident, caring relationship with caregivers/midwives. This, therefore, enabled the women to boost their sense of self, and to recognize their capabilities, as well as their "embodied knowledge". Conclusion: Caregivers/midwives should be aware of the hardships the women face. Hardships stem from experiences of migration and resettlement as well as from structural constraints such as the "triple jeopardy" of ethnicity, SES and gender, which increase women's needs of support in childbearing. Such awareness is necessary when promoting health and reducing the unnecessary suffering and victimization of women, their children, and their families. It is a matter of patient safety and equity. © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Migration Quality of care Women discrimination Perinatal support Intersectional approach

health disparity pregnancy complication human middle aged Ethnic Groups Stress, Psychological mental stress priority journal Professional-Patient Relations ethnic group controlled study social support gender identity qualitative research human relation human rights Self Efficacy Young Adult Sweden social status migrant Humans Empathy Emigrants and Immigrants female pregnancy self concept clinical article Article obstetric delivery adult migration midwife health care quality Prejudice Midwifery content analysis labor complication Emigration and Immigration ethnicity health care system social class maternal health service Maternal Health Services Delivery, Obstetric Healthcare Disparities health care disparity caregiver health care need