Jane Denton, Director of the Multiple Births Foundation (MBF) and Co-lead of the Elizabeth Bryan Multiple Births Centre (EBMBC) at Birmingham City University has called for improvements to the quality of care for women with twin and multiple pregnancies following the release of a new report.

The Perinatal Confidential Enquiry: Still Births and Neonatal Deaths in Twin Pregnancies has been published by the MBRRACE�UK collaboration led by Oxford University:

The report looked at 50 twin pregnancies in 2017 where one or both of the babies died. Its aim was to review the quality of care � compared against national guidelines for best practice � to determine whether different levels of care may have made a change for the babies and the mother.

The report found high quality care in only a minority of cases where one or more twins had died. It also showed that recommendations in many medical guidance documents, including the NICE Multiple Pregnancy Guideline, were also not fully implemented. The report determined that if care had been better, around one in two babies may not have died.

Jane Denton, Director of the Multiple Births Foundation (MBF) and Co-lead of the Elizabeth Bryan Multiple Births Centre (EBMBC) at Birmingham City University, said:
�While it is well established that all multiple pregnancies have higher risks for women and their babies it is always extremely distressing to hear that babies� lives may have been saved with different and better care.
�Most striking and of great concern in this excellent report is the failure to follow the many sources of guidance and implement the recommendations which could have made a difference. In some cases the effective leadership and communication that are required for the provision of high quality services were not evident.�

Key findings included:
Only half of the women had a discussion with health professionals about their individual risks, particularly the signs and symptoms of preterm birth; Less than half were looked after by a multidisciplinary team of experts in twin pregnancies; Bereavement care was poor for around three in five women with many not given any support to help them cope with their loss.
Jane Denton, who was a member of the NICE Multiple Pregnancy Guideline Development Groups and chair of the Topic Expert Group for the NICE Multiple Pregnancy Quality Standard continued:
�Immediate action must be taken by commissioners, professional bodies and service providers throughout the UK to implement the recommendations urgently.
�In future work, the MBF and EBMBC will draw on the important findings of this report to develop education and research to drive improvements in provision of maternity care, bereavement care and nurturing support to families with twins.
�We lend our voices to the call to action heralded in the report and hope that its publication will provide impetus for meaningful and impactful change.�