Perinatal Bias & Newborn Assessment Training
Enhancing cultural competency in Devon's maternity services
Project
overview
- Perinatal Bias and Newborn Assessment (PBNA) training addresses perinatal care and clinical assessment inequity, focusing on implicit bias and stereotyping for black, Asian and minority ethnic families.
- Extended PBNA training’s reach across the South West by enabling maternity practitioners to disseminate training to frontline maternity staff within their organisations.
Partners involved
Health Innovation South West supported the founding midwives to create and deliver a ‘Train the Trainer’ programme to achieve faster spread and adoption across the region.
Project
detail
To advance our mission to deliver equitable and quality care in maternity services, the Partnership supported Torbay and South Devon Trust to extend the reach of PBNA training.
In Torbay and South Devon NHS Trust, Specialist Public Health Midwife Hannah O’Sullivan and Education Lead Midwife Katherine Morgan recognised the need to address perinatal bias.
With our support they undertook Perinatal Bias and Newborn Assessment training, reflecting on their own biases to drive change. Subsequently, they received resources from the Partnership to conduct local colleague training.
The training incorporated non-white skinned mannequins, re-evaluating equipment calibration and terminology, and recording ethnicity in patient records. The training also looked at enhancing communication tools and provided resources for community midwives.
Staff feedback was positive, prompting plans for further training expansion to integrate clinical and human factors.
The midwives acknowledge this as an ongoing process, emphasising gradual progress toward equitable care provision.
Impact from this work
- The maternity department mandated Perinatal Bias and Newborn Assessment training after they completed their training at Health Innovation South West.
- All midwifery and obstetric staff are now allocated time to complete the training on a mandatory training day.
- The compliance level is over 90% for midwives, maternity support workers, and 100% for consultant obstetricians.
