Tommy's Birmingham centre to help pave the way towards better maternity care
The Government has established The Maternity Transformation Programme which is working to implement the recommendations of the Better Lives Report – the aim is to improve antenatal services by giving parents more choice about where they give birth and importantly making pregnancy and birth safer for everyone. An important part of making changes in the NHS is to test them in a few areas, learn about how it works in practice, before rolling out to all of the NHS.
Seven areas have been selected to test how better care might be delivered in pregnancy and these are:
Birmingham and Solihull
Cheshire and Merseyside
Dorset
North Central London
North West London
Somerset
Surrey Heartlands
We’re delighted that one of the test areas is in Birmingham where Tommy’s newest centre focusing on early miscarriage is based.
So what’s going to be different?
- Using small teams of midwives to offer greater continuity of care to women – it is hoped that your midwife getting to know you better will improve the care you receive and help identify any potential problems much sooner.
- Creating single points of access to a wider range of maternity services – this will give your midwife easier access to a wide range of experts who can help you in your pregnancy.
- Making better use of electronic records to provide more joined up care – this will help the health professionals caring for you to understand more about your total health care needs not just your pregnancy health needs.
- Improving postnatal care – this should give parents greater support as they adjust to parenting a baby.
- Providing better personalised care planning – this should give parents greater choice about where they give birth whether that’s in an obstetric unit, a midwifery led unit or at home.
The changes are designed to help reduce stillbirth and neonatal death and there is evidence from other countries that continuity of care (seeing the same midwife) has reduced pre-term birth so we’ll keep you updated about progress with this exciting initiative.
Read more our miscarriage centre
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Our quest to get amazing independent documentary Still Loved continues…
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This miscarriage sketch illustrates what words can not
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Mum whose waters broke just 16 weeks into pregnancy gave birth to her baby at 28 weeks old.
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Professor Heazell says cases like Kassadie’s reminds us of the need for more research into pregnancy complications
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Artist raises money and awareness for Tommy’s with a rainbow tree.
Read more pregnancy in the news
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Our quest to get amazing independent documentary Still Loved continues…
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This miscarriage sketch illustrates what words can not
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Mum whose waters broke just 16 weeks into pregnancy gave birth to her baby at 28 weeks old.
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Professor Heazell says cases like Kassadie’s reminds us of the need for more research into pregnancy complications
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Artist raises money and awareness for Tommy’s with a rainbow tree.
Tommy’s news
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Our quest to get amazing independent documentary Still Loved continues…
Help us end the silence around baby loss and get this film to the silver screen. -
This miscarriage sketch illustrates what words can not
Curtis Wiklund's drawing went viral after he shared on Instagram to comfort others who are hurting. -
Mum whose waters broke just 16 weeks into pregnancy gave birth to her baby at 28 weeks old.
Sheila Batti gave birth to baby Ryann prematurely after her waters broke early. -
Professor Heazell says cases like Kassadie’s reminds us of the need for more research into pregnancy complications
A 20 week scan revealed Kassadie-Maria was very poorly. Her mother Clare Conway was prepared for the worst but baby Kassadie has defied all expectations.