Professor Jonathan Morris (Professor of obstetrics) said the rate was up from 8 per thousand in 2019 to 9.1 per thousand in 2020. Describing this rate rise as “slight”. Later in the article it was pointed out that this equates to 100 more families in NSW alone who suffered a stillbirth in 2020 than in 2019. I don’t know about you but I’d be willing to bet that none of those families , nor indeed anyone of us who has suffered a stillbirth, would describe a 100 more deaths in just one State as a “slight” rise
Why did this rate rise occur? The usual suspects are blamed including the move from face-to-face consultation to telehealth, strain on maternity services and my favourite (NOT) the mothers fault delaying ‘presentation” to hospital because of being “anxious” to attend. The report adds that it was “too early to pinpoint a cause”
This is where I beg to differ. Far from it being too early it is WAY too late to try to pinpoint a cause. Why? Because the rate data is two years old. Even if a cause was pin pointed and mothers were blamed for delaying presentation what can be done about it now? If that cause was “pin pointed” at the time then strategies and education could have been put into place. Now its WAY to late to act even if a cause could be pinpointed
I have heard time and time again a “wouldn’t that be lovely” in response to my and others requests to collect and quickly report stillbirth rate data. Jurisdictional boundaries and regulations and MANY other issues are cited as “reason’ why we cant get data on stillbirth rate until it is WAY too late to know if telehealth, strain or anxiety have anything or everything to do with it.
But is it actually possible to get that information before 2 years has passed? Certainly, I point you to what we know about Covid -19 by way of example. We know , rates from every jurisdiction within 24 hours, not only that we know ages of victims and even if they have “underlying conditions”. This information has enabled us to learn so much more about Covid than we would have known if all the data we had was 2 years old! The information includes what we need to look out for and how to protect ourselves. Has this information evolved over the course of the pandemic BECAUSE of our immediate access to information? YOU BETCH YA.
Information we have from our Covid experience tells us that we can, and indeed we MUST collect and report data about stillbirth rate FAR more frequently than we currently do and IF we do we will discover further risks and ways to protect women and families from stillbirth in time to take steps to actually address the likely problem AND to see the effect of any changes we make !
I challenge those who are in a position to influence the collection and reporting of stillbirth data to make it available as quickly as they can in much the same way as Covid deaths are reported. Daily if possible, weekly at the outside. This will have the combined effect of raising community awareness of stillbirth but also allow us to make any changes to the way antenatal care is delivered across Australia in response to real-time data rather than trying to shut the stable door 2 years after the horse has bolted.