An opportunity to learn of the world-first national program that is aiming to safely lower the preterm birth in Australia has attracted more than 200 health professionals to a special event held recently in Sydney.
Through a Commonwealth grant awarded to the Women and Infants Research Foundation (WIRF), the Australian Preterm Birth Prevention Alliance, the Women’s Healthcare Australiasia, the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, and Safer Care Victoria have formed the Every Week Counts: National Preterm Birth Prevention National Collaborative.
This Collaborative is a two-year initiative aimed at reducing preterm and early term birth across Australia by 20% by supporting hospitals to deliver evidence-based changes in clinical care.
Recently teams from more than 50 Australian maternity hospitals attended the first critical Learning Session of the National Collaborative.
They represented every state and territory, from the very largest metropolitan tertiary services to smaller key services in regional and remote communities providing critical local care.
Leading obstetricians, midwives, GPs, sonographers, neonatologists together with consumer and quality improvement experts all met with the hope to bridge the gap between what is actually happening on the ground and what we now know will improve outcomes for women and their babies.
For the period of the National Collaborative, participating hospital teams will be supported to accelerate their learning and develop reliable systems to ensure all women are offered the care, public health information, and support mechanisms to safely reduce rates of preterm and early term birth.
The second Learning Session will be held in Melbourne from 20-21 March 2023.
