News Releases
Award-Winning Journalist Shares Stillbirth Experience with Chilton Memorial Nurses
Released: 08/13/2004
POMPTON PLAINS, NJ (August 9) … One out of every 200 wanted pregnancies in the U.S. ends in stillbirth, and nine times as many babies are stillborn than die as a result of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. Surprisingly, American society seems to know little about this family tragedy that devastates parents and family members.
To emphasize how caregivers leave permanent impressions when they treat stillborn mothers and to stress the need for additional follow-up services, Lorraine Ash, an award-winning health care and women's issues reporter with the Daily Record, recently addressed nurses, psychologists, social workers, and clergy at Chilton Memorial Hospital in Pompton Plains, New Jersey.
Ash, who authored the recently released book, Life Touches Life: A Mother's Story of Stillbirth and Healing, shared a compelling account of the death of her daughter and only child five years ago, and how she personally coped with stillbirth after carrying her baby full term. She explained how she progressed through grief, searched for resources to help her move forward in life, and wrote a book to help others cope, as well.
"Chilton Memorial is very pro-active in encouraging its nurses to benefit from additional educational opportunities that can hone their clinical skills or increase their sensitivity to patients," Health Start Coordinator Sue Garrett said. "Lorraine Ash's talk was very beneficial because it was positive, and because it offered us a different perspective."
Garrett said Chilton Memorial's labor and delivery staff takes many of the special steps to console parents that Ash recommends. She also explained that bereavement coordinator, Anne-Carol Schlerf, RN, sits with grieving families at the hospital's conference room to share a memory box with footprints and resources to contact, and to assist with funeral arrangements.
Schlerf emphasized that she also reinforces that the parents are not at fault, and later makes follow up calls to their homes.
"Sometimes, we stay in touch for years," Schelerf said, referring to the contact kept with stillbirth parents. "One woman decided she wanted me to be her L&D nurse for her next delivery, and when she learned I was going on vacation, insisted on being induced before I left. You get really close to these people."
Schlerf is starting a peri-natal bereavement support group at Chilton Memorial to help families who have suffered miscarriages, stillbirths, or newborn losses - from 7:30 - 8:30 p.m. on the third Monday of each month at the hospital's Collins Pavilion.
"Some fathers are not ready for it, right away," Schlerf said. "But the women are, and anything we can do to help them get through helps. I've been a nurse for 35 years, and this is the group you can make a real difference with. People go through grief at different rates. I don't profess to have a cure all, but if it helps them realize they are not alone, to go forward rather than stagnate, and if it helps them open themselves up to talking to each other because they don't feel comfortable talking with family members at that point, it's worth it."
Shlerf, Garrett, and Reverend Howard Hinman all agreed with Ash that it is sometimes much more important to remain silent and to simply be present than to talk following a tragedy such as a stillbirth, when parents are in the throes of their deepest grief. Ash also encouraged caregivers to take steps to make every person walking into the room - from nurses to dietary aids and pathologists -- aware of the situation through signage and possibly even room location. She stressed how critical it is for health care professionals to make the hospital experience as optimal and supportive as possible for parents, and suggested that ultra sound rooms not be filled with photographs of babies if mothers are expected to deliver stillborn children.
Ash is scheduled to appear at the 14th annual Perinatal Bereavement Conference in Las Vegas in October. Her book is available at booksellers throughout North America and on-line. Those interested in more information about it can visit www.LorraineAsh.com
Chilton Memorial Hospital is a fully accredited, 256 bed, acute-care, community hospital that offers services from its family-centered obstetrics program featuring home-like labor/
delivery/recovery rooms, to New Vitality, its award-winning health and wellness program for those 50 and older that aims to keep its members physically fit, mentally alert, and emotionally connected. It offers a full range of sophisticated diagnostic radiology testing. Additional services include the Chilton Cancer Center, the Comprehensive Breast Center, a Cardiac Catheterization/
Angiography Suite, a state-of-the-art Emergency Department, a pain management center, a sleeping disorders center, a wound healing center, and a weight loss surgery program. Chilton Memorial was the first hospital in the state to be awarded a perfect score by the Joint Commission Accreditation of Health Organizations which evaluates more than 18,000 health care institutions world-wide. It is located at 97 West Parkway in Pompton Plains, NJ 07444. For more information about Chilton Memorial's facilities and services, please visit its award-winning web site at www.chiltonmemorial.org. or call 1-888-CHILTON.
Photo Caption 1
Lorraine Ash, award-winning journalist and author, addressed nurses, social workers, and pastors at Chilton Memorial Hospital.
Photo Caption 2
Reverend Howard Hinman, pastoral care director of Chilton Memorial Hospital, shares an observation with author Lorraine Ash at her recent presentation about stillbirth at the Pompton Plains, New Jersey hospital.
Search our other news releases by clicking on
the month/year below.
