Safer Beginnings

Safer Beginnings was a joint programme of work by Best Beginnings and the White Ribbon Alliance UK, supported by 18 delivery partners. We have co-created new resources for parents and healthcare professionals, to increase their knowledge and access to support to help reduce incidents of violence and harm during maternity care.  This programme funded by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport through the 2021-2022 TamponTax Fund.

Content to Enable, Educate and Support People on Maternity Journeys

There is a great need for maternity care to be trauma-informed – assessing every person as potentially carrying trauma and ensuring that their needs are understood. Trauma-informed care can help ensure people’s physical and emotional safety during pregnancy and birth. 

The Safer Beginnings programme enabled healthcare workers to deliver trauma-informed care and to educate and support pregnant people to have self-agency in their maternity journeys.  

Working alongside 18 delivery partners and supporting 8 onward additional organisations through the provision of onward grants to further their work in maternal safety the programme aimed to improve maternity outcomes and postpartum safety for 70,950 women by 2023. 13,350 of these are women from ethnic minority communities in England, Wales and Scotland.  

The Importance of Maternal Safety

Violence of any form during pregnancy and the childbearing year can result in devastating and traumatic experiences and outcomes for women and their babies. When it comes to maternal safety, women are especially vulnerable if they have experienced trauma or harm in the build-up to or during their pregnancy. It could be related to experiences of FGM, sexual assault, domestic violence, or due to a need for greater cultural safety in maternity systems.

There is a great need for more care to be trauma-informed – assessing every person as potentially carrying trauma and ensuring that their needs are understood. Harm can result when good communications are not established and maintained in maternity care. 

Overview of the Programme

Safer Beginnings aimed to improve maternity outcomes and post-partum safety for women and birthing people. To do this, the programme envisioned developing specialist information, services and resources that enable self-advocacy in maternal safety from obstetric and domestic abuse/violence and female genital mutilation or cutting (FGM/FGC). A key driver for our work was to address the fact that Black, Asian and ethnic minority women and birthing people experience disproportionate adverse outcomes in maternity care. The reasons are multi-factorial but include barriers to accessing formal maternity services, endemic structural racism, poor maternal education, poor health literacy and deprivation. 

This project was driven by participatory action research (PAR) framework which involved collaborating with and training 18 delivery partners. Partners were third sector and/or advocacy groups. Additionally, 8 onwards grants were made to UK organisations whose work focused on aspects of maternal violence and harm.

Through this project it was envisaged that the resources would empower 70,950 women and birthing people - 13,350 from ethnic minority communities - 2,000 health care professionals, and 200 NHS Trusts with knowledge and confidence to act before/when they are at risk of maternity-related violence. There was an explicit commitment to prioritise safeguarding and employ a trauma-informed approach to the process of content production and the nature of the content produced. This was supported by all partners being offered training on trauma informed practice by Make Birth Better (June 2022). Delivery partners’ wellbeing was also supported via a free debriefing service provided by a clinical psychologist which was available throughout the entirety of the project.

Our Approach

The programme sought to address the danger of disrespectful, abusive or coercive treatment of women and birthing people – whether due to violence, assault or abuse that has impacted on them outside of their maternity care or due to poor care in the maternity system. We wanted to draw attention to violations of women’s autonomy, human rights and reproductive health and to find ways to equip women and maternity care professionals to navigate these sensitive topics in a trauma-informed way to both ensure that existing harms or trauma are not exacerbated or triggered and also to help prevent harms or trauma from happening inside the maternity care system. 

We know that individual voices and experiences are vital to improving maternity care. By increasing understanding of how culturally specific inequalities related to obstetric and domestic abuse/ violence and FGM/FGC informed care affect women, we have co-produced resources that can empower women from all backgrounds – and in particular those from Black, Asian and minority backgrounds - to seek safety.

Safer Beginnings Resources

The Safer Beginnings project yielded several impactful outputs, which included the following:

  • A “Free from Harm” resource about Obstetric Violence by the White Ribbon Alliance

  • Written content and articles in the Baby Buddy app

  • 15 co-produced films all integrated into the Baby Buddy app. These films address important topics such as identifying abusive relationships, understanding consent in maternity care, and navigating the impact of trauma on pregnancy and birth.

  • An Emotional Safety Plan developed by For Baby’s Sake Trust

  • A series of audio podcasts exploring in detail the different perspectives shared by researchers and advocates working in the space of creating safer maternity care.

Free From Harm, by White Ribbon Alliance UK

White Ribbon Alliance UK strongly believes that improving the safety of giving birth includes not only short-term physical outcomes but long-term emotional and psychological ones too. WRA also believes that unless the same concern and consideration is given to health care professionals’ well-being and emotional safety, cycles of violence and distress will continue to occur. Respectful care must include those providing care too. WRA has also produced a new Free From Harm (FFH) resource, intended not only to raise awareness of the need to eliminate violence and minimise harm in the perinatal period, but to equip health care professionals (HCPs) with the information and tools to do so. It also aims to help midwives recognise when their own human rights are not being upheld and understand how this impacts them.    

New Baby Buddy content, by Best Beginnings  

Specialist co-produced Safer Beginnings content has been embedded into the free, award-winning Baby Buddy app, endorsed by the Royal College of Midwives, the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, and the Royal College of Psychiatrists. 

The new films and articles for parents have been published in the Baby Buddy Discover library and on YouTube. Resources include 15 new short films on the themes of ‘safer care’ and ‘safer relationships’, each around 1 - 5 minutes in length, with additional films from partners, plus written articles and signposting. 

The new films and articles offer support, guidance and practical tools for parents and parents-to-be, particularly those who have experienced trauma or harm. Topics include self-advocacy in maternal care, emotional safety, stress responses, FGM/FGC, sexual abuse and domestic abuse. 

All content has been created in collaboration with parents, community groups, healthcare professionals and charities, each sharing their expertise and lived experience of trauma, self-advocacy and rights in maternity care.  

All Safer Beginnings content can be accessed in the Discover section of the Baby Buddy app. Please download Baby Buddy here. 

Emotional Safety Plan

For Baby’s Sake has created a new tool called an Emotional Safety Plan. The Emotional Safety Plan is a tool that will support the whole family including mums, dads, co-parents, or non-birthing partners to record what they may need to feel emotionally safe before, during and after birth.

Safer Beginnings Podcasts

  • Episode 1: FACTORS INFLUENCING SELF-AGENCY IN ETHNIC MINORITY WOMEN
    A conversation between Dr. Shaima Hassan and Jaskiran Gill Please listen here

  • Episode 2: BIRTHING BEYOND BOUNDARIES: SELF-AGENCY IN THE CONTEXT OF OUT OF GUIDELINES BIRTHS

    A conversation between Dr. Claire Feeley and Arya Pimprikar Please listen here

  • Episode 3: EMPOWERING MATERNAL VOICES: AMPLIFYING THE EXPERIENCES OF BLACK AND MIXED HERITAGE WOMEN
    A conversation between Amanda Smith and Yasmin Morgan Please listen here

  • Episode 4: THE COMPLEX LANDSCAPE OF SELF-AGENCY WITHIN THE REALM OF MATERNITY CARE A conversation with Rishita Nandagiri

    Please read the conversation here. 

Safer Beginnings Onward Grants Programme 

In April 2022, we launched our Safer Beginnings onwards grants programme, inviting organisations who work to support women and girls during their maternity and early years transition into parenting to apply for a grant of up to £40,000. Applications were assessed by our onward grants panel and successful applicants attended a pitch day in London, which resulted in 8 organisations receiving funding. 

Individual voices and experiences are vital to improving maternity care and we’d like to thank all of the brilliant organisations that applied and took part in this process. 

Safer Beginnings Programme Delivery Partners

Safer Beginnings was delivered in partnership with 18 organisations and specialists working within maternity and violence and harm prevention. We are eternally grateful to each of our partners for their significant contribution to this programme of work.

Safer Beginnings Evaluation reports

If you’re interested in learning more about the Safer Beginnings programme, please read our evaluation report.
Summary of the evaluation of the Safer Beginnings programme

Safer Beginnings was led by Best Beginnings and White Ribbon Alliance and co-created with: