02 Paola Wilkin, Jane Houston y Megan Arbor    (Spanish and English)
Channel: Virtual Midwives
Date: 2023-05-13

VIDM 2023: Quantitative assessment of postpartum blood loss: A quality improvement initiative for Mestizo Peruvian Midwives (Spanish and English)

Facilitator: Paloma Terra

Postpartum Haemorrhage (PPH) remains one of Peru's leading causes of maternal morbidity and mortality, with nearly 20% of maternal deaths caused by PPH in 2019. Early recognition of PPH and prompt treatment remains challenging in low-resource obstetric settings, including among Mestizo midwives in Peru.  Midwives and obstetricians may experience barriers to the timely diagnosis and management of PPH including access to quantitative blood loss measurement methods, and timely haemoglobin blood laboratory tests. In addition, formalized PPH diagnosis and management training may not be available.

PURPOSE/AIM: The purpose of this quality improvement initiative is to increase the accuracy of postpartum blood loss measurement by Mestizo Peruvian midwives through hybrid educational sessions.  

Methods: 3 international midwives collaborated to develop this quality improvement project. Clinically practicing midwives, midwifery interns, and midwifery students were recruited from the 2 main public hospitals in Arequipa, Peru to participate in a web-based training module, and subsequent live skills demonstration regarding how to quantitatively assess postpartum blood loss.  The primary author is a Mestizo Peruvian dentist and midwife, and all materials were developed in a linguistically and culturally safe manner.

After the web-based training module, participants were surveyed on their level of comfort and self-efficacy with quantitative blood loss measurement using google forms, distributed via WhatsApp. 

This quality improvement initiative was deemed exempt by the Frontier Nursing University IRB.

Results: Preliminary results and the next steps will be available and shared during the presentation.