born-pei.ca

QEH

BORN — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 14:45:09 +0000

BORN wishes to convey their sympathy to the young couple who
suffered a fetal loss and who seemed unable to access the care they
were seeking and needing. BORN awaits the outcome of the investigation announced
by QEH realizing that, whatever that outcome, bleeding in pregnancy is
frightening and a miscarriage is accompanied by pain, disappointment,
and sadness.
The issue of loss in pregnancy is one that concerns both BORN
and other volunteer groups concerned with maternity care. We have
raised the issue at meetings before and would love to see P.E.I
follow in the steps of other health districts which have a clear
policy that if a woman arrives at an ER and is suspected of loss in
pregnancy that she be allowed to wait in a quiet separate area and
provided with professional support and follow up care. It is BORN’s
position that the QEH provides the highest standard of care to
Islanders and without knowing the facts of the case, we do not seek
to place blame on any particular individual or the staff at the QEH.
We do feel it appropriate to state at this time that there are better
systems in place and hope they will be applied in the future. It
should also be noted that as Midwives provide prenatal care as
primary caregivers, they are available to clients when issues arise in
a pregnancy for a timely assessment of the situation. BORN, as a
committed group of volunteers, will continue to work toward obtaining
more birthing choices for pregnant women on PEI.”

BORN AGM June 5th 2010

BORN — Tue, 25 May 2010 13:00:25 +0000

Please come to the BORN AGM see Events for more details.

CBC News Story on Midwifery Implementation

BORN — Sun, 23 May 2010 15:51:27 +0000

http://www.cbc.ca/health/story/2010/05/20/pei-midwifery-program-taskforce-584.html

Health Minister Commits to Midwifery Implementation Task Force

BORN — Sun, 23 May 2010 15:31:02 +0000

The BORN Co-operative has received a positive response from the Health Minister. Her Hon. Carolyn Bertram has confirmed that the Department of Health in PEI will set up a Midwifery Implimentation Task Force. Your comments on our Petition were a huge help. Read all the great comments on the copy of the Petition here. midwifery-and-doula-care-for-pei_052310

Meeting with Health Minister

BORN — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 19:04:17 +0000

BORN is very excited to share the news that we have a new Health Minister,Carolyn Bertram. Her Honor has agreed to meet with BORN and talk about Midwifery for PEI. Please take the time to use our online petition on this web site to congratulate her Honor on her new post and thank her for being open to a discussion about Midwifery and Doula Care for PEI.

Canadian Public Health-Caring for Mom & Baby

BORN — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 14:00:37 +0000

Canadian Public Health has put up a great new web site for Mom’s and Babies http://you-and-your-baby.cpha.ca/

BORN chair guest on new health show ‘Au Natural’

BORN — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 15:30:34 +0000

Eastlink cable’s health show ‘Au Natural’ will be interviewing co-chair of BORN, Robyn Brehaut, on March 11th, Wednesday night at 8:30 and again on March 15th, Sunday at 7:30pm. The new show is hosted by naturopathic Dr. Kali Simmonds and her co-host Dr. Lana McMurrer. They cover a range of health topics from a naturopathic perspective. Next week’s topic is Pregnancy and Childbirth with a focus on midwifery, doula care, and BORN.

Make sure to tune in on Wednesday night!

http://www.eastlink.ca/eltv/ELTV_Programs/AuNatural.asp

ABC News - Labour Orgasms called ‘Best Kept Secret’

BORN — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 14:27:51 +0000

Moms, Experts Say Relaxation Is Key to Pleasurable Childbirth
By JUJU CHANG and GAIL DEUTSCH
Dec. 9, 2008

View the short video news segment at this link:

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/story?id=6120045&page=1

BORN News 2009

BORN — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 13:37:43 +0000

BORN is having it’s first member meeting of the new year on Tuesday, January 13th at 6:30. We are always welcome to new members, so please contact us for more information if you would like to attend.

We will be focusing on our upcoming meeting with the Provincial Health Department regarding midwifery legislation and a review or our overall 2009 Agenda.

In other news, we have added a new listing under Resources for Families. It is a support group for women who have experienced the loss of an infant through miscarriage or other complications, called Broken Hearts - Shattered Dreams. Their contact information is listed under Support Groups.

We are planning to have a productive year and hope that we will make some major headway with the new Liberal Government on the Midwifery issue. Please check in often for updates on our progress over the coming year!

Happy New Year,

From Members of BORN

BORN’s Concerns with QEH Renovation plans

BORN — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 12:41:28 +0000

Dear Mr. Rick Adams, QEH Executive Director and Ms. Marionn Clark, QEH Interim Director of Nursing:

While reading the most recent newsletter released by the QEH, we were discouraged to discover the new renovation plans for QEH have ignored the dire state of the labour/delivery and postpartum units. While we applaud the addition of one birthing suite for the unit and the recent policy changes to help keep mothers and babies together, we notice there are no further renovations planned for the maternity ward. Currently, the unit has the capacity to offer the birthing suite to only one third of the women who birth at the hospital. Research shows that healthy women and babies should not be in contact with the general hospital population to prevent the spread of disease. In moving toward raising the standard of care at the QEH we would like to know when the hospital plans to bring this unit up to standard.

A quote directly from the Family Centered Care Guidelines, which all health institutions across Canada are working towards, states, “Women should…be supported in a warm, comforting one-room environment, where they can labour, give birth, spend time with their babies and be cared for, together, without disruption of being moved from place to place, or being separated from their newborn.” Even though the QEH is moving in the right direction with their new rooming-in policy for mothers and babies, the facilities still do not provide the proper environment.

The Guidelines also state, “…caring for women is best done in the context of their families. Therefore, families should be comfortably accommodated in the environment and feel part of the process.” Currently, there is no family waiting room available in the labour and delivery unit, and new policies state that children under the age of 12 are not welcome in the unit at any time. The current space and policies in place are obviously not recognizing or honoring families as an integral part of the birth process for the women giving birth at QEH. This type of environment creates an undue amount of stress on a birthing mother when she needs to feel as comfortable and safe as possible in order to have the best possible outcome for mother and baby. Women have contacted our group and expressed that they are very concerned at the prospect of being separated from their older children while they are at the hospital.

For women having a Cesarean birth, the Guidelines recommend, “ …the operative/cesarean birth room and recovery area should be located within the maternal and newborn care area.” QEH protocol is to keep mothers after surgery in a General Recovery area with any number of patients from all areas within the hospital. This puts a woman in direct contact with other possibly sick patients and risks the health of mother and newborn. During this lengthy period of time, the mother is left alone with no support from family or caregivers, and is separated from her baby.

In the postpartum maternity ward, based on the National Guidelines, “ No other services should be provided in area, nor should clients from other services be cared for in the maternal and newborn area.” Again, this is not the case at QEH. Women, who have had a variety of gynecological surgeries including hysterectomies and miscarriages, are placed in the maternity ward for their recovery. Not only can this be an emotional assault on women recovering from these types of surgeries, but it is also a health risk for mothers and newborns to again be exposed to possible sicknesses.

The current climate at the hospital has not resulted in improved rates of continued breast feeding either. As you are aware BORN Cooperative is committed to seeing that Midwives and Doulas become a part of the maternity care offered in PEI. We respectfully remind you that a healthy start in life is a good precursor to a healthy adult who in turn will need less expensive medical care in the future.

PEI families deserve up to date facilities that allow for Family Centered Care to be fully implemented and available to all. We continue to hear from women who choose to birth out of the province or in Summerside to avoid the antiquated facilities at the QEH. If we hope to bring young families to PEI and keep them here, we must offer contemporary care. In our meetings with the medical community we have heard the willingness to provide Family Centered Care. This is much more than bricks and mortar, however an out of date facility makes their job more difficult. We hope to hear a reason as to why expecting families are not being considered during the renovations on our hospital.

We have had very positive interaction with the current government in our discussions of improvements to maternity care in PEI. We also have been very encouraged by the nursing staff at both hospitals who have made it clear they embrace the movement toward family centered care through both public forums and private meetings. We hope to continue to work with the hospital and women’s organizatons across P.E.I to move to fully adapting Health Canada’s Guidelines.

Sincerely,

Robyn Brehaut

President of BORN Cooperative