This paper describes the timeliness of lead maternity carer (LMC) engagement and discusses factors associated with timely engagement, using data from the Growing Up in New Zealand longitudinal study, which enrolled a diverse sample of 6822 pregnant women during 2009 and 2010. Timely engagement was defined as before 10 weeks’ gestation. Of 6661 women (98%) who stated they had a LMC, 6012 (90%) reported the time taken to engage a LMC. Eightysix to 92% of women engaged a LMC in a timely manner, depending upon the estimate of gestational time used. Factors independently associated with delayed engagement were Māori (OR 0.59; 95% CI, 0.44 to 0.80), Pacific (OR 0.63; 95% CI, 0.46 to 0.86), or Asian (OR 0.51; 95% CI, 0.39 to 0.67) ethnicity; first pregnancy (OR 0.71; 95% CI, 0.58 to 0.88); age <20 years (OR 0.62; 95% CI, 0.41 to 0.94); socioeconomic deprivation (OR 0.69; 95% CI, 0.52 to 0.92); and LMC type being a hospital midwife (OR 0.47; 95% CI, 0.38 to 0.60), or a combination of care providers (OR 0.60; 95 CI, 0.42 to 0.90).
