What are the risks?

Most women start to feel their baby move sometime between 16 and 22 weeks of pregnancy, and feeling baby move is a sign that he or she is doing well. Although every baby’s frequency of movement during pregnancy is different, it is vitally important to recognise if baby is moving less than usual or if you cannot feel baby moving anymore. 

In some cases, reduced foetal movement can be a sign of infection or other problems. The sooner reduced foetal movement is identified, the sooner mum can get the right treatment and care that could save a baby’s life.

How can Baby Buddy help?

In order to improve communication between mum and healthcare professionals about reduced foetal movement, the Local Maternity System (LMS) of Shropshire, Telford & Wrekin set out to improve messaging to pregnant women in the community. Having already embedded Baby Buddy as a resource and trained 40 midwives to cascade Baby Buddy throughout maternity services, the LMS wanted to go a step further.

In collaboration with Best Beginnings, the LMS co-designed a personalised message to reach Baby Buddy users when they were 28 weeks through their pregnancy journey. The notification is post-code activated, meaning that the message provides detailed instructions on who to contact in Shropshire, Telford & Wrekin in case of concern around foetal movement.

With uptake of Baby Buddy exceeding 50% of the birth cohort quarterly, the Shropshire, Telford & Wrekin LMS is making great strides to ensure parents and parents-to-be are receiving evidence based and clinically endorsed health information that is personalised to their region. 

Want to know more?

If you are a healthcare professional or work within your Local Maternity System, and would like to discuss how the Baby Buddy app can be used to enhance your health messaging to parents and parents-to-be, please get in touch with our operations team: [email protected]