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Improving perinatal pelvic health care in south east London
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In south east London we are working together with people and local communities to transform and improve pelvic health care. We aim to support those experiencing mild to moderate pelvic health issues during pregnancy or up to a year after giving birth. Pelvic health wellbeing is important throughout life.
We have been listening to women, birthing people and families to understand more about their experience and learn more about what support they need. We wanted to understand what information, education, individualised care and treatment will be helpful to protect during pregnancy and postnatal pelvic health.
How you can get involved
If you have had a baby at Guy’s and St Thomas Hospital, King's College Hospital, Princess Royal University Hospital, Queen Elizabeth Hospital (Woolwich), Lewisham University Hospital since June 2022 please complete the below survey:
If you have received care from the Perinatal Pelvic Health Service (physio or midwife) either through virtual clinics, group therapy or individual appointments at Guy’s and St Thomas Hospital, King's College Hospital, Princess Royal University Hospital, Queen Elizabeth Hospital (Woolwich), Lewisham University Hospital since June 2022 please complete the survey below:
We invited women and birthing people to share and feedback about their experience via an online survey. See the survey summary report.
With support from the below community groups we reached women and birthing people from a diverse background (Punjabi, Lithuanian, Polish, Traveller community, Albanian, Urdu, Vietnamese, Portuguese/Spanish, Arabic and Somali, Tamil, Mandarin and Yoruba, Turkish and Bengali) to learn more about their experiences.
Lewisham Islamic Centre
Indoamerican Refugee and Migrant Organisation IRMO (Lambeth)
Latin-American Women’s Rights Service LAWRS (Southwark)
Mindful Mums (Lewisham, Greenwich, Bromley)
Refugee Resettlement Programme by Refugee Council (Lewisham)
MASIC
Strategic Migration Partnership East of England Local Government Association
Five X more
We delivered face to face and virtual engagement sessions in different communities to understand better about people experience of perinatal pelvic health
What people told us helped to design and set up a new pelvic health care services in South East London and below there are few of actions we took.
What we heard
What we did
People do not seek help for pelvic health issues because it is embarrassing, and the media normalises incontinence.
We developed four sensitive questions that are asked at booking and a various points before and after the birth to support people opening up about their pelvic health issues
If they have the courage to speak up the response received from health care professionals was not sensitive or they were just told the issue was normal.
We developed a training package for health professionals (GPs, health visitors, midwives, and doctors) to ensure they learn to identify pelvic floor issues but also use patient’s stories provided by people who have experienced pelvic health issues to highlight the impact on their lives. Over 1600 already trained.
Pelvic health information and resources are not always available in their language.
We supported the translation of 11 pelvic health videos in to multiple languages. We also translated our surveys into languages from women who are disproportionally affected by worst pelvic health outcomes because of their ethnicity.
People want to learn how to prevent the issues before it happened and want to know where to seek help.
We developed antenatal pelvic health classes for women to understand how to look after their pelvic health issues, how to prevent and self-management issues and how to refer to our specialist clinics. As per March 2024 over 1350 women and birthing people attended these classes.
There were not services available and/or the waiting list was long.
We recruited a specialist physio and specialist midwife who now are able to see women and birthing people from the antenatal period all the way up to 12 months. They can also refer into more specialist services if they require further treatment.
News!! Insights and recommendations from our engagement work were used in the development of national Implementation guidance for Perinatal Pelvic Health Services. Our service users engagement approach by involving diverse groups, antenatal pelvic health education classes, collaboration with maternal mental health services and education and training for healthcare professionals there are nationally recognised and showed case for best practise. See - Case study 1: South East London – Engagement with diverse groups
Next steps
We are aiming to continuing improving the South East London perinatal pelvic health service providing the best care to women and birthing people that have experienced pelvic health problems after birth. We will carry on reaching out to those underrepresented communities experiencing poorer outcomes and all other elements that we developed as part of this service.
In south east London we are working together with people and local communities to transform and improve pelvic health care. We aim to support those experiencing mild to moderate pelvic health issues during pregnancy or up to a year after giving birth. Pelvic health wellbeing is important throughout life.
We have been listening to women, birthing people and families to understand more about their experience and learn more about what support they need. We wanted to understand what information, education, individualised care and treatment will be helpful to protect during pregnancy and postnatal pelvic health.
How you can get involved
If you have had a baby at Guy’s and St Thomas Hospital, King's College Hospital, Princess Royal University Hospital, Queen Elizabeth Hospital (Woolwich), Lewisham University Hospital since June 2022 please complete the below survey:
If you have received care from the Perinatal Pelvic Health Service (physio or midwife) either through virtual clinics, group therapy or individual appointments at Guy’s and St Thomas Hospital, King's College Hospital, Princess Royal University Hospital, Queen Elizabeth Hospital (Woolwich), Lewisham University Hospital since June 2022 please complete the survey below:
We invited women and birthing people to share and feedback about their experience via an online survey. See the survey summary report.
With support from the below community groups we reached women and birthing people from a diverse background (Punjabi, Lithuanian, Polish, Traveller community, Albanian, Urdu, Vietnamese, Portuguese/Spanish, Arabic and Somali, Tamil, Mandarin and Yoruba, Turkish and Bengali) to learn more about their experiences.
Lewisham Islamic Centre
Indoamerican Refugee and Migrant Organisation IRMO (Lambeth)
Latin-American Women’s Rights Service LAWRS (Southwark)
Mindful Mums (Lewisham, Greenwich, Bromley)
Refugee Resettlement Programme by Refugee Council (Lewisham)
MASIC
Strategic Migration Partnership East of England Local Government Association
Five X more
We delivered face to face and virtual engagement sessions in different communities to understand better about people experience of perinatal pelvic health
What people told us helped to design and set up a new pelvic health care services in South East London and below there are few of actions we took.
What we heard
What we did
People do not seek help for pelvic health issues because it is embarrassing, and the media normalises incontinence.
We developed four sensitive questions that are asked at booking and a various points before and after the birth to support people opening up about their pelvic health issues
If they have the courage to speak up the response received from health care professionals was not sensitive or they were just told the issue was normal.
We developed a training package for health professionals (GPs, health visitors, midwives, and doctors) to ensure they learn to identify pelvic floor issues but also use patient’s stories provided by people who have experienced pelvic health issues to highlight the impact on their lives. Over 1600 already trained.
Pelvic health information and resources are not always available in their language.
We supported the translation of 11 pelvic health videos in to multiple languages. We also translated our surveys into languages from women who are disproportionally affected by worst pelvic health outcomes because of their ethnicity.
People want to learn how to prevent the issues before it happened and want to know where to seek help.
We developed antenatal pelvic health classes for women to understand how to look after their pelvic health issues, how to prevent and self-management issues and how to refer to our specialist clinics. As per March 2024 over 1350 women and birthing people attended these classes.
There were not services available and/or the waiting list was long.
We recruited a specialist physio and specialist midwife who now are able to see women and birthing people from the antenatal period all the way up to 12 months. They can also refer into more specialist services if they require further treatment.
News!! Insights and recommendations from our engagement work were used in the development of national Implementation guidance for Perinatal Pelvic Health Services. Our service users engagement approach by involving diverse groups, antenatal pelvic health education classes, collaboration with maternal mental health services and education and training for healthcare professionals there are nationally recognised and showed case for best practise. See - Case study 1: South East London – Engagement with diverse groups
Next steps
We are aiming to continuing improving the South East London perinatal pelvic health service providing the best care to women and birthing people that have experienced pelvic health problems after birth. We will carry on reaching out to those underrepresented communities experiencing poorer outcomes and all other elements that we developed as part of this service.
Page last updated: 29 Apr 2024, 05:11 PM
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