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UK Wedding News

23/10/2014

Plan To Reduce Stillbirths By 50% Announced

An initiative to halve the number of stillbirths and baby brain injuries in the UK has been launched.

The five-year plan by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG) hopes to reduce the number of stillbirths, early neonatal deaths and brain injuries in the UK as a result of incidents during term labour, by 50%.

Around 500 babies a year die, or are left severely disabled, due to complications in labour.

From January 2015, the RCOG will launch its 'Each Baby Counts' project and will collect and analyse data from hospitals in order to try and improve future care. Using this information, the RCOG has said it will then be able to suggest recommendations for improved practice.

In turn, these action plans will then be monitored by measuring the trends and geographic distribution of deaths and severe brain injuries in the future.

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Professor Alan Cameron, RCOG Vice President for Clinical Quality, explained: "Stillbirth, neonatal death or the birth of a baby at full term but with brain injuries are life-changing and tragic events which often affect women and their families for many years.

"At the RCOG we do not accept that all of these are unavoidable tragedies and have committed to reducing this unnecessary suffering and loss of life by 50% by 2020.

"Our task is to collect data from all UK units to identify avoidable factors in these cases. We will monitor where these incidents occur and why. Sharing of these sensitive data will provide us all with a unique opportunity to improve the care we provide and save lives."

Professor Zarko Alfirevic, Co-Principal Investigator for the Each Baby Counts project, added: "Most pregnant women receive exemplary care during labour in our NHS hospitals, but tragically, some babies die or are left severely brain-damaged.

"Currently, when these events occur they are investigated locally, however, because the lessons learned from these local reviews are not being shared, opportunities to improve care at a national level are being missed.

"The Each Baby Counts project aims to pool the results of local investigations to gain a national picture and develop actions to prevent these tragedies from recurring."

'Each Baby Counts' will be launched at the RCOG today (Thursday 23 October).

(JP/MH)

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"An initiative to halve the number of stillbirths and baby brain injuries in the UK has been launched."