Am I Allowed? Your Baby, Your Body, Your Choice
Am I Allowed is an exclusive Pinter & Martin Podcast, with Tannice Hemming. Tannice discusses the issues of informed consent, evidence gathering and good decision making for expectant women and birthing people.
All episodes of Am I Allowed can be found here, as well as on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Or you can listen using the player below.
With the overwhelming weight of information from differing sources around pregnancy, labour and interventions, how can you ensure the decisions you make during your maternity journey are right? Is your sister’s experience representative of your future labour? What about your friend’s? How can you weigh up the evidence versus your own, personal circumstances?
Wading through very dry and complicated statistics is tough. So is solely listening to recommendations and opinions from healthcare professionals (HCPs), which sometimes conflict with each other. Then there’s the amount of scary stories that abound on social media, too. Loud voices online which are polarised between “ignore health professionals and aim for a completely natural birth at all costs” versus “do exactly what your doctors tell you, you’re putting your baby at risk”.
Why is informed consent so important?
With an estimated 1 in 3 birthing women and people experiencing birth trauma; and postnatal depression affecting 10-15% of everyone (1) who gives birth, informed consent and good decision making is absolutely key.
"[Women and birthing people] who feel lack of control during birth or who have poor care and support are more at risk of developing PTSD” Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder following Childbirth - (Ford and Ayers) (2)
Research (3) suggests that lack of information, feeling uninvolved in decision-making, poor communication with healthcare professionals and lack of choice and consent is behind a lot of birth trauma. Another study identified that “care provider actions and interactions can influence [birthing women and people’s] experience of trauma during birth” (4).
To try and counteract these difficulties, Tannice’s podcast will lead you through a journey of discovery to learn more about truly informed consent, how to advocate for yourself, ask for evidence and find the best information. Then she’ll explain exactly how to weigh up these different choices and reach a decision that feels right and is evidence-based... even if you later change your mind, once again!
All episodes of Am I Allowed can be found here, as well as on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Or you can listen using the player below.
With the overwhelming weight of information from differing sources around pregnancy, labour and interventions, how can you ensure the decisions you make during your maternity journey are right? Is your sister’s experience representative of your future labour? What about your friend’s? How can you weigh up the evidence versus your own, personal circumstances?
Wading through very dry and complicated statistics is tough. So is solely listening to recommendations and opinions from healthcare professionals (HCPs), which sometimes conflict with each other. Then there’s the amount of scary stories that abound on social media, too. Loud voices online which are polarised between “ignore health professionals and aim for a completely natural birth at all costs” versus “do exactly what your doctors tell you, you’re putting your baby at risk”.
Why is informed consent so important?
With an estimated 1 in 3 birthing women and people experiencing birth trauma; and postnatal depression affecting 10-15% of everyone (1) who gives birth, informed consent and good decision making is absolutely key.
"[Women and birthing people] who feel lack of control during birth or who have poor care and support are more at risk of developing PTSD” Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder following Childbirth - (Ford and Ayers) (2)
Research (3) suggests that lack of information, feeling uninvolved in decision-making, poor communication with healthcare professionals and lack of choice and consent is behind a lot of birth trauma. Another study identified that “care provider actions and interactions can influence [birthing women and people’s] experience of trauma during birth” (4).
To try and counteract these difficulties, Tannice’s podcast will lead you through a journey of discovery to learn more about truly informed consent, how to advocate for yourself, ask for evidence and find the best information. Then she’ll explain exactly how to weigh up these different choices and reach a decision that feels right and is evidence-based... even if you later change your mind, once again!
Tannice Hemming uses her own lived experience, as a mum of three, coupled with her knowledge of maternity services and experience in the scientific method to guide families towards empowered decision making. Having experienced gestational diabetes, induction, breastfeeding issues, planned caesarean (for breech position), pulmonary emboli, high dependency care in pregnancy, a miscarriage and a home birth after caesarean during a pandemic, she brings a wealth of personal experience of maternity services. She is expecting fraternal twins in Autumn 2022 to complete the family. “Four and no more” turned into five!
Tannice is proudly neurodiverse, receiving a diagnosis of autism in December 2018. She uses her experience as a neurodiverse woman to inform perinatal research and maternity services.
Professional maternity-related experience
Professionally, Tannice writes maternity articles, translating complex medical information into features which help families make decisions that are right for them. She co-authored, co-produced and co-designed the celebrated “Bump, Birth and Beyond” website for the Kent and Medway Local Maternity System. A passionate supporter of maternity rights and campaigner/activist, she has appeared on various local and national media speaking about Public Health where it relates to antenatal and postpartum issues affecting women and birthing people.
Tannice also has experience working with NHS England’s Maternity Transformation Project, her local Kent and Medway NHS as a Maternity Voices Partnership Chair, Health Education England (Trauma Informed Care e-learning creation project), Public Health England (PHE) and the UK Government’s Department of Health and Social Care. She is involved in many Steering Groups and Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement research projects using her varied lived experiences and experience with engaging with service users. Her most recent appointments include PPI lead at the UK Obstetric Surveillance System (UKOSS) and British Association of Perinatal Medicine (BAPM) Steering Groups.
Find Tannice on twitter @tannice_
Tannice is proudly neurodiverse, receiving a diagnosis of autism in December 2018. She uses her experience as a neurodiverse woman to inform perinatal research and maternity services.
Professional maternity-related experience
Professionally, Tannice writes maternity articles, translating complex medical information into features which help families make decisions that are right for them. She co-authored, co-produced and co-designed the celebrated “Bump, Birth and Beyond” website for the Kent and Medway Local Maternity System. A passionate supporter of maternity rights and campaigner/activist, she has appeared on various local and national media speaking about Public Health where it relates to antenatal and postpartum issues affecting women and birthing people.
Tannice also has experience working with NHS England’s Maternity Transformation Project, her local Kent and Medway NHS as a Maternity Voices Partnership Chair, Health Education England (Trauma Informed Care e-learning creation project), Public Health England (PHE) and the UK Government’s Department of Health and Social Care. She is involved in many Steering Groups and Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement research projects using her varied lived experiences and experience with engaging with service users. Her most recent appointments include PPI lead at the UK Obstetric Surveillance System (UKOSS) and British Association of Perinatal Medicine (BAPM) Steering Groups.
Find Tannice on twitter @tannice_