Rebecca Moore Perinatal Psychiatrist
Emma Svanberg Perinatal Clinical Psychologist
Chloe Mulholland Midwife and Hypnobirthing teacher
Jenny Mullan Founder Birth Trauma ResolutionTherapy
Debbie Chippington Derrick AIMS
Helena Belgrave Perinatal Counselling Psychologist
Maria Booker Birthrights
Louise Nunn Perinatal Mental Health Specialist Midwife
Suzy Reading Psychologist
Introductions
All present introduced themselves and outlined their hopes for the group:
· Rebecca Moore, Consultant Perinatal Psychiatrist. Rebecca has a special interest in birth trauma and organises an annual birth trauma conference. She organised the meeting with the aim of exploring a trauma led pathway of care, creating training programmes for maternity professionals.
· Chloe Mulholland - Midwife and hypnobirthing teacher. Chloe has seen an increase in birth trauma and is interested in discovering ways to help women have more positive birth experiences.
· Jenny Mullan – Jenny was a hypnobirthing teacher and then created Birth Trauma Resolution therapy with the Human Givens institute. Jenny raised the issue of trauma in maternity staff as well as service users.
· Debbie Chippington Derrick – Chair of AIMS and founder of caesarean.org.uk Debbie has recently taken on the role of Chair and described the differences they are undertaking, including increasing volunteers on the helpline and changes to the website.
· Emma Svanberg – Clinical Psychologist. Emma works with women and their partners, and recently began the Make Birth Better campaign to raise awareness of birth trauma and help women and their families find support. She will also be involved in some doctoral research next year looking at trauma in patients and staff in maternity services.
· Helena Belgrave – Counselling Psychologist. Helena worked in IAPT in the perinatal period, and now works in private practice.
· Louise Nunn– Perinatal Specialist Midwife. Louise described the specialist pathway for women with mental health problems at her Trust – one of the Better Births Early Adopter sites. This includes a Universal Screening tool to identify women at risk, and a toolkit for all practitioners to use with their clients (including detailed birth planning and support from all HCPs), and has been very successful in improving outcomes for their patients.
· Maria Booker – Programmes Director, Birthrights. Maria told us about the different services Birthrights is currently offering, including an Advice Line and training to HCPs. They are also currently conducting a study exploring Maternal Request for C-sections.
· Suzy Reading – Psychologist and Mum & Baby Yoga teacher. Suzy talked about the importance of body work in resolving trauma. She has also recently published a book ‘The Self-Care Revolution’, helping people support their mental wellness.
· Winsa – Working mum with lived experience of two traumatic births. She is hoping that the group will work together to improve birth for mums, so that people don’t have to go through the same experience that she did.
Goals
· As a group, we agreed that when discussing birth trauma we are not referring only to PTSD criteria, but also traumatic symptoms and distress after a difficult birth, as well as pregnant women who may be vulnerable to trauma.
· We agreed that the main goal for today’s meeting was to think about a mission statement for the group. Ideas centred around the following themes:
o Support for staff – it was agreed that staff are currently under such stress that it is difficult to provide compassionate care
o Raising awareness through campaigning. Emma agreed that as a group we can expand on the Make Birth Better campaign to fit the group’s purpose. Maria can feedback to Stakeholder Council, APPG and National Maternity Voices.
o Training to HCPs (including GP’s and PALS to provide better support). Birthrights already offers some workshops for professionals which we could consider.
o Explore how to create change in encouraging trauma-informed services – we wondered what a trauma-informed pathway might look like. Collecting examples of good practice might be a useful starting point
o Inform antenatal education. Being reduced in many trusts or NCT are providing. Can we discuss meaningful discussion about different possible outcomes in antenatal education, including the importance of comprehensive birth planning.
o Create resources and disseminate in accessible way (leaflets? Fridge magnets?)
o Provide support for those who can’t access services (accessible website – could expand on MBB website?) ?Include on the website a ‘what to say to your GP’ section. Include option to translate website (?button that can be added)
o Explore options for debriefing (including separating debriefing from complaints procedure).
o Identify key sources of trauma.
· Identified that we need to look at intervening before, during and after birth.
AOB
· We also discussed whether Universal Screening was being used throughout Trusts (to discuss with MVPs?)
· Raised the importance of awareness of birth trauma in partners
· Discussed factors which might dissuade people from accessing support, such as fear of social services involvement. We considered that pathways can promote transparency and could reduce such anxieties.
· Talked about how best to collect and promote resources, both ante and post-natally.
· Agreed that support during birth seems to be absolutely key to preventing trauma
· Discussed IAPT – there is a Pan London IAPT referral form we can view on the Healthy London website
· Discussed useful resources such as How to Heal a Bad Birth and Emma Sasuru’s support groups.
Next Meeting
· Create mission statement and identify immediate goals.
Action Points
Louise to share the mental health toolkit used in her service
All to add resources/services that they are aware of to the Make Birth Better website (www.makebirthbetter.org/gethelp)
Emma and Rebecca to discuss changes to MBB website to feedback to rest of group