Survey finds women with post-birth injury experience diagnosis delays and severe mental health impacts

ABC NEWS (Australia)

A new survey has found that women with injuries after childbirth are experiencing diagnosis delays, which can have severe mental health consequences. Birth Trauma Australia says women who struggled to get a diagnosis were 2.4 times more likely to experience suicidal thoughts.

Transcript

00:00There are many contributing factors to birth trauma.

00:05In the recent survey that we did amongst our community, so we had a sample of just under

00:10400 women and we asked them to actually describe in their own words what contributed to their

00:16trauma and then we pulled some themes and 60% of women indicated that emergency interventions

00:26such as emergency caesareans, such as instrumental deliveries were a big contributing factor.

00:33Other things included ongoing pain or mismanaged injuries.

00:39Women talked about being coerced into making decisions.

00:42And women talked about loss of control or lack of informed consent or lack of information

00:48to prepare for the birth experience as well.

00:50So there are a number of factors that contribute.

00:53And then it's not only around the birth itself, but it can be that journey to parenthood.

00:58So it can be difficulties in pregnancy, in the birth and then ongoing challenges in the

01:03postnatal period as our survey highlighted.

01:06It has a huge impact and it ripples out not only in that immediate postnatal period, but

01:11well beyond.

01:12In fact, while a huge part of the support that we provide are to women and parents in that

01:17first year postpartum, many women don't find us until they're two years, two to five years

01:23down the track.

01:24Maybe they're thinking about having another baby and they've just suffered silently with

01:28either psychological or physical symptoms, but they haven't had adequate treatment.

01:32Well, the issue is, is that women are falling through the gaps in care.

01:37So you can't pinpoint it to one particular condition.

01:39What we find is that women will experience symptoms of trauma.

01:44They may seek care from their, whether it's their maternity care provider, whether it's

01:50from their GP.

01:51But it really is a postcode lottery and it's their ability to self-advocate to get the care

01:56that they need.

01:57And that's just not good enough.

01:58There needs to be clear care pathways.

02:00So women can get support regardless of whether they've got physical or psychological trauma.

02:05In our survey, in fact, 98% of participants indicated that they were suffering from emotional

02:11trauma alongside ongoing physical or ongoing physical challenges as well.

02:17Over the last eight years, we have supported women that have indicated to us that they have

02:22gone to the darkest of places because they cannot get support.

02:26They are dismissed.

02:27Symptoms that they're suffering with are classed as normal.

02:30Women are told, what do you expect?

02:31You had a baby.

02:33And women have communicated to us that they've had thoughts of ending their life.

02:37So in the survey that we did, we had an optional question around birth trauma.

02:43And what we found is that women that were diagnosed within six weeks with physical injuries or supported

02:50in those six weeks, still 17% of them talked about thinking about ending their life.

02:56But those with a delayed diagnosis who struggled to get a diagnosis up to a year, 60% of participants

03:03had thoughts of ending their life.

03:05And I think we should really highlight, and I just don't think it gets the attention that

03:08it deserves, is that suicide is the leading cause of maternal death in the first year postpartum.

03:14And we need to talk about it.

03:15And we talk about it by reducing stigma and creating care pathways.

03:20Yeah, we've started a petition, a change.org petition, and we're calling for a national

03:24strategy to support women that are experiencing physical, ongoing physical challenges or birth

03:31injuries.

03:31And so this looks like standardised postpartum care for all women.

03:36It needs to be accessible.

03:38It needs to be equitable.

03:39We need GPs to be upskilled alongside our maternity care providers so that people have somewhere

03:45that they can go for support.

03:47And of course, we need investment into the organisations at the frontline supporting parents

03:52as well.

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