Parents Centre NZ supports ‘Sleep on Side' Campaign

28 June 2018

Parents Centre NZ supports ‘Sleep on Side When Baby’s Inside’ Campaign

“All babies are precious and anything we can do to help have a positive influence on their outcome, is a privilege to be part of”, says Liz Pearce, Parent Education and Operations Manager at Parents Centres New Zealand who was involved in the working group to promote the Sleep on Side when inside campaign.

The ‘Sleep on Side when baby’s inside; Stillbirth Prevention Campaign’ #sleeponside is rolling out nationwide this week and advises expectant mums to sleep on their side from the 28th week of pregnancy. This campaign has been developed by the University of Auckland and Ministry of Health, in partnership with child health research charity Cure Kids.

Parents Centre were involved in a multidisciplinary group to produce resources for both maternity professionals to support their conversations with women about this advice, and resources specifically for the pregnant woman and her whānau.

This research confirms that pregnant mums sleeping on their side from 28 weeks pregnant, halves the risk of stillbirth compared with going to sleep on their back. It’s estimated that if all pregnant women go to sleep on their side from 28 weeks of pregnancy, there would be a 10 percent decrease in late stillbirths nationally.

The advice to pregnant women during the third trimester is to go to sleep on their side for every sleep, including; going to sleep at night, returning to sleep after any night-time awakenings and day-time naps. And it doesn’t matter if it is the left or the right side.

Parents Centres New Zealand are the leading providers of Childbirth Education programmes which are tailored for pregnant couples from 28 weeks onwards. This is a critical time for this advice to be discussed and reinforced to mothers to help reduce their chances of stillbirth.

We would like to recognise that this research is not going to bring back those angels that were lost but not forgotten, but to let all mothers know that this is new research and has been developed to help reduce any future stillbirths.

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