Doula: noun A Doula is a trained and experienced partner who accompanies and supports a woman through pregnancy and childbirth and the first few weeks of family life.
Themes
Impact on health throughout pregnancy and birth
How to replicate a service
The Goodwin Volunteer Doula Service provides tailored and consistent emotional and practical support to women during pregnancy, childbirth and the early weeks of family life. It also provides a place where women can access training, gain and share experiences and find out more about working with and supporting isolated pregnant women.
As with all successful grassroots organizations, the Goodwin Volunteer Doula Service in Hull was motivated by a small group of local women who wished to do something positive for pregnant women in the face of difficult personal, social and economic conditions. Goodwin Development Trust, as part of the local Sure Start programme, identified a gap in provision of support for women from disadvantaged communities around childbirth, and in September 2005 the Goodwin Volunteer Doula Service was piloted. Since then the project in Hull has trained 64 volunteers and supported over 200 women. Over the past three years the project has developed and now offers support from, and to, women all over Hull and is currently joint funded by Hull Teaching PCT and Hull City Council via the Early Years fund.
The project also recently became joint winner of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Maternity Award for inclusive services for disadvantaged communities in partnership with Hull & East Riding Maternity Services, and celebrated with a day down in London collecting the award.
In April 2009 the project was awarded £270,000 from the Department of Health to replicate the programme to eight other areas in the UK over three years.
What do the volunteers do?
Individual volunteers are matched with pregnant women:
Provide non judgemental, consistent and tailored support for isolated and vulnerable women and their families throughout the latter stages of pregnancy, childbirth and for the first 6 weeks of family life.
Enthusiastically promote the benefits of natural birth and breastfeeding to ensure these women have knowledge around all options available to them, feel empowered to make their own decisions and therefore have the best possible birth outcome and the healthiest possible start in life for their children.
What training do volunteers receive?
All of the volunteer doulas complete a free extensive training course which is accredited to levels 2 and 3 with the Open College Network.The training covers:
- 2 day Preparing for birth weekend
- 2 day Breastfeeding weekend
- Hospital and birthing centre tours
- Child Protection Level 1
- Domestic Violence Awareness
- Smoking Cessation in Pregnancy
- Evening sessions covering:
* Cultural Diversity
* Working with interpreters
* Communication Skills
* The role of the doula before and after birth
* Health & Safety
* Multi-agency working
And ongoing monthly training sessions covering topics such as…
* Natal Hypnotherapy
* Sexual Health
* Links into Education and Employment
* Self Defense
* Drug Awareness
* Aromatherapy
Recruitment and Support of Volunteers
The volunteer doulas are recruited from the local community through a variety of routes namely the local media, posters, leaflets, volunteering fairs, word of mouth, the local hospitals and volunteer centre.They attend an open evening to find out more about the project and then an informal interview.Obviously they are all CRB and reference checked.
The doulas themselves receive intensive support from the paid team.The monthly meetings mentioned above are a chance to access training and the doulas can offer each other support.We also provide one on one supervisory sessions three times throughout the time they are matched with a mum, reimburse all expenses such as mileage, taxis and childcare in full, provide a mobile phone, use of an internet connection and library.Since the project was set up, we have trained 64 volunteers, and currently have 35 active.18 volunteers have moved on to study midwifery or adult nursing degrees and 6 have moved into employment.
Impact of the service
Our results for the last year demonstrate how robustly the Goodwin Volunteer Doula Service is developing, and give a glowing indication of what we can all achieve when we work together to support one another.
From January 2008 - January 2009, we have received 120 referrals. Of these, we have gone on to support 84 mothers-to-be. 59 of these ladies have given birth to date, and a further 11 have come to us for postnatal support only. 34 of these births (58%) were entirely normal births; 11 (19%) were by caesarean section, and 14 more (24%) had an epidural.
84% of the mums we supported have initiated breastfeeding, including both teenage mums and mums from the HU8 and HU9 areas, which we are particularly encouraged to see. We have also seen increasing numbers of mums referred into the Smoking Cessation in Pregnancy team.
Replication
The Goodwin Volunteer Doula Service has now been awarded £270,000 funding through the Department of Health, to support eight other areas of the country to set up the service in their area.As part of this a comprehensive tool package has been developed which new areas will be offered.This includes
- Project establishment
- Human resource expertise
- Consultancy support and advice for a minimum of one year
- Training package
- Train the trainer
- The Goodwin Doula Volunteer Training Manual
- The Goodwin Volunteer Doula Service Manual
A Replica Workshop is being held at the Goodwin Centre in Hull on Wednesday 1st July, 2009 for any organizations who are interested in replicating this very successful package in their area.
