For health professionals

Good practice

The kind of care that women or couples receive from their GP, hospital or community staff can make a real difference to how they cope with the experience of pregnancy loss.

Everyone wants good medical care, based on up-to-date knowledge of miscarriage, ectopic or molar pregnancy. But the human aspects of care are also very important. Kindness, understanding, clear information and sensitive language are just some of the ways that doctors, nurses, midwives and sonographers can help people cope with miscarriage.

Most health professionals work hard to provide good and sensitive care – and many of them will have been through miscarriage themselves. We work to support those doing good work and to encourage others to adopt better practice.

There are several sources of guidance, training and support on the provision of good care.

Training

“It made me think about the way I communicate with patients, the importance of giving clear explanations and information when dealing with pregnancy loss, and that each case is individual.”

Caring for patients with miscarriage, ectopic or molar pregnancy can be a satisfying and rewarding part of your work. It can also be challenging, uncomfortable and sometimes distressing.

The Miscarriage Association offers in-house training tailored to meet your needs. We aim to increase your understanding, knowledge and skills and to support the care that you provide to miscarriage patients.

Topics include:

Breaking bad news
Talking with patients about miscarriage: facts, feelings and terminology
The range of experiences and needs – and how to respond
Special circumstances: ectopic and molar pregnancy, recurrent miscarriage, assisted conception
Helping patients make difficult decisions: management, post-mortem, disposal
Caring for the carers
The role of the Miscarriage Association
Miscarriage: facts, feelings and the GP (for GP trainees)

Costs: full day £600, half day £350 and 90 minute session £150, plus expenses. See below for VTS training.

GP training

GP Principal Dr Niki Davies writes:

“Following my own miscarriage I became a Trustee of the Miscarriage Association. During my GP training I was very aware of my lack of skills and knowledge to be able to help and counsel women and their partners through a pregnancy loss. I have therefore worked with the Miscarriage Association to develop a 2-3 hour training session which I hope you might like to incorporate into your programme.”

Miscarriage: Facts, Feelings and the GP is a 2 – 3 hour training session written specifically for GP Trainees covering the physical, practical and psychosocial aspects of pregnancy loss.

Feedback from delegates includes:

“A really helpful session – lots to think about”

“Excellent and engaging speaker”

“Really good – brought up lots of issues which I would not have otherwise thought of”

Costs: £200 + travel costs (from Wakefield by train) for a 2-3 hour session.

Other events

We also speak at a range of national and international conferences and study days organised by other organisations, including the Royal College of Nursing, the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists the European Society for Human Reproduction and Embryology and the Association of Early Pregnancy Units.

If you are planning a conference or study day and you would like a representative from The Miscarriage Association, please contact us and we will try to help.

We warmly recommend the annual conference and AGM of the Association of Early Pregnancy Units. The next conference takes place on 17 and 18 November 2011.