Sharp discusses importance of education in pregnancy loss and Hope After Loss Clinic's memorial services
Early pregnancy loss is very common; about one in four pregnancies will end in loss. While medical care for early pregnancy loss is well-established, there has historically been less of a focus on the mental and emotional aspects of pregnancy loss. The UW Health Hope After Loss Clinic offers a warm and supportive atmosphere for those who have experienced pregnancy loss at any stage of pregnancy, at any point in time in the past. The clinic’s unique model offers both medical and emotional care for individuals affected by loss.
The clinic also provides care for individuals who are pregnant after a prior pregnancy loss and those who wish to be pregnant after experiencing loss.
“What we really just try to do is provide individualized, supportive care, because each family that’s experienced a loss may have a very similar loss situation as someone else, but their needs are totally different,” said Kristen Sharp, MD, professor in the UW Department of Ob-Gyn and co-founder of the Hope After Loss Clinic alongside health psychologist Julianne Zweifel, PhD. “We see a wide range of folks who have been touched by loss. It can be people who have had early miscarriage, it can be people who have had upwards of full-term stillbirths, or even people who have lost babies after birth.”
In addition to Drs. Sharp and Zweifel, the clinic recently welcomed Hannah Copp, CNM, a certified nurse midwife, to the team. Her experience and approach have been exceedingly valuable to patient care in the clinic.
Residents in the UW Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology also have the opportunity to train in the Hope After Loss Clinic. Training at the clinic provides a different perspective on the medical aspect of pregnancy loss.
“I can speak to my training, I got really no training in the grief and bereavement aspects of the loss, so I think having that exposure, seeing people at different parts of their journey, and also knowing ‘How can we best support people while they’re on that journey?’ is a really valuable piece of education that I hope [the residents] carry forward in their careers,” said Sharp.
In addition to their services, the Hope After Loss Clinic hosts a memorial service for patients who wish to honor their loss. This year will be the clinic’s fifth year hosting the memorial service.
The memorial service was created to honor the losses of families who have had an early pregnancy loss – a loss under 20 weeks of gestation – at UW Health or Meriter. “For folks who experience early pregnancy loss, there’s not a whole lot of options to memorialize that pregnancy, to bury that pregnancy, if that’s what they desire, or even know that that’s an option,” Sharp said. “You have certainly folks who have a much later loss who get presented with those options, but there just wasn’t really anything available for early losses, and I think there’s just something so powerful in recognizing that loss, honoring that loss, which also helps give support and validation to that family who lost that baby.”
The memorial is completely free of charge for the families, and a service occurs along with the burial, which includes the presence of a chaplain from UW Health American Family Children’s Hospital, as well as music.
The Hope After Loss memorial service is hosted annually on the first Wednesday of October, in honor of Pregnancy, and Infant Loss Awareness Month. Learn more about the Hope After Loss Clinic and its services here.
**by Ob-Gyn Communications Intern Melis Baskaya