Response to the Consultation about the Draft Stillbirth Clinical Care Standard

The Australian Psychological Society (APS) is pleased to have been invited by the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care (ACSQHC, the Commission) to respond to the consultation survey regarding the national Draft Stillbirth Clinical Care Standard (the Draft Standard) and associated supporting resources.

The APS acknowledges that the perinatal period brings many gains and, at times, losses such as stillbirth and increased vulnerability for mental ill-health. The APS commended the Commission on developing the Draft Standard as a critical clinical tool for optimising the health and wellbeing of individuals and families who are at risk of, or experience, stillbirth.

The APS response focused on high-quality stillbirth prevention and care from a psychological health perspective, including:

• Ensuring stillbirth bereavement care and support is evidence-based.
• Embedding an ethos of inclusive, person-centred care for all pregnant people, their partners, and families by avoiding cisgendered and heteronormative language.
• Strengthening the expectation that clinicians adopt culturally appropriate models of perinatal care, inclusive of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, by properly acknowledging cultural knowledge of pregnancy and birthing.
• Ensuring clinician communication and language encourages healthy pregnancy behaviours and monitoring, but without creating undue pressure or feelings of sole responsibility and stigma should stillbirth occur.

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