Maternal Mental Health Service

The Maternal Mental Health Service provides assessment and psychological interventions to women or birthing parent who experience moderate to severe mental health conditions relating to the maternity experience, focussing on birth trauma, fear of child birth (tokophobia) or baby loss.

Type

Maternal mental health service

The Maternal Mental Health Service is a specialist service that provides assessment, support and psychological care for people who develop moderate to severe mental health difficulties relating to their maternity experience. This includes people who have experienced:

  • a traumatic birth
  • an extreme fear of child birth (known as tokophobia) or
  • a loss of a baby and/or complex fertility issues.

It is important that you get the right support. In the first instance, contact your GP, midwife or health visitor and let them know what you are experiencing and ask them to make a referral to this service.

Who is this service for: People across Northamptonshire with moderate to severe mental health condition related to their maternity experience.

*Patients and service users will be seen at locations across Northamptonshire or via video call*

Address

Campbell House, Campbell Square, Northampton, NN1 3EB

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How do I register for this service?

The service does not accept self referrals. Please speak to a health professional to be referred.

Referrals can be made by any health professional working with an individual including midwives, health visitors, GP’s, hospital based teams and mental health services.  

A member of the clinical team is available to discuss potential referrals during working hours. 

Within two weeks of receiving a referral, a team member will arrange an appointment to carry out an initial assessment. From this if we agree that this is the right service for you, we will build a plan of care to suit your needs and further appointments with a team member. The appointments will be offered at locations across Northamptonshire, or via Microsoft Teams.

If after the initial appointment we agree this service is not right for you, we will signpost you to a service more suited to your needs.

Contact us

The service is available to contact Monday - Friday between 9am and 5pm.

Telephone: 03000 270 480

Email: nhft.perinatal@nhs.net

If you are a medical professional please click the link below to refer your patient

Specialist Perinatal and Maternal Mental Health

If you are in need of mental health support outside of these hours, please call the Mental Health Number on 0800 448 0828. Lines available 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Reviews and feedback

We value your feedback in order to help us develop our services and ensure that we're making a difference for you, with you.

If you would like to provide your feedback please take a moment to complete the I Want Great Care form.

Accessibility Information

As a service, we are committed to making any adjustments which service users require in order to receive care.

Please speak to your medical professional who is referring you to the service (for example, GP, midwife) if you have any accessibility requirements at the point of referral.

Professionals

The Maternal Mental Health Service is a psychology led service for people experiencing moderate to severe mental health difficulties which directly relate to their maternity experience. This includes perinatal loss (including complex fertility), severe fear of pregnancy and/or childbirth (tokophobia), or a traumatic childbirth. 

This service works with maternity and bereavement services and can provide assessments, psychological care and support (birth planning / peer support).

Service criteria

The service accepts the following referrals:

  • Pre-conceptions referrals – relevant in cases of primary tokophobia
  • Where an individual is not pregnant – in the context of complex fertility and loss
  • Where an individual has experienced a traumatic birth
  • Referrals made from 0-24 months* (referral for mothers of infants between 12-24 months will be assessed on a case by case basis) 

The service will not accept referrals for people when there is intervention and/or separation of the child(ren) from the mother due to safeguarding concerns or removal of a child by court order.

Please complete a referral form (on the contact us tab).

Once a referral is received it will be reviewed to confirm it meets the criteria for the service. If it does, an appointment will be made with the individual. The service has a two to six week lead time to complete an assessment and create a treatment plan for the individual. A letter of acceptance or non acceptance of the referral will be sent to the referrer, the individual and their GP. Where the referral is not accepted, the individual will be signposted to other appropriate services and this will also be detailed within the letter.

At the end of the individual's time with the service, they will then be discharged or discharged to other appropriate service if required and a letter will be sent to the referrer, patient and their GP.

Support we can provide

Pregnancy after loss

Pregnancy after loss

During Baby Loss Awareness Week (9-15 October) the Maternal Mental Health service and bereavement Midwives came together to talk about baby loss and share information about the support that is available.

The Maternal Mental Health team discusses pregnancy after loss:

Understanding bereavement and loss

Understanding bereavement and loss

Some families lose their baby during pregnancy, birth or shortly afterwards. For many people, grief comes in stages as a cycle. Grieving is unique to each person and individual's may experience this in different ways.

Dr Kirsty Harris discusses bereavement around baby loss:

W hen it is important to seek help 

Grieving is a normal reaction to a loss. Even after a long period of time we learn to manage our feelings that come with grieving. However, some people need support with their mental health when: 

  • The symptoms of grief feel continuous and become harder to cope with over time. 
  • Feelings of grief become so intense and overwhelming that they significantly impact your day-to-day living
  • Experiencing symptoms including PTSD and /or severe depression.

How we can help

The service will carry out an assessment to explore whether your grieving process is linked to a mental health condition such as PTSD or depression. We will consider all options to ensure you receive support that is tailored to your needs. 

Types of therapy you may be offered include:

  • Individual therapy
  • A ‘Family and Friends’ session - Your partner and family members may also have difficulty processing their grief. They may find it hard to understand and need help dealing with their distress as well as yours.
  • Peer support work- this will involve receiving support and simply talking to someone who may have had a similar experience to you.
  • Group Therapy - this is delivered in a group offering a range of methods and the opportunity to meet other people with similar needs and experiences to you.

We will also ensure you are aware of other support organisations that are appropriate for you.

Understanding birth trauma

Understanding birth trauma

Birth trauma is a short phrase for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after childbirth. It can also affect people who have some symptoms of PTSD, but not enough for a full diagnosis.

33% of people describe their perinatal experience as traumatic. About 1-3% of women develop symptoms birth-related PTSD.  Some partners may also suffer PTSD from a traumatic birth.

Trauma is individual and for this reason, the same situation can affect people differently.

The Maternal Mental Health service talk about birth trauma and the impact this can have:

What you may be experiencing

If you’ve had a traumatic birth you may have felt scared, helplessness, out of control, or powerless at the time. Following the birth, you may experience the following:

  • Re-experiencing the traumatic event- through flashbacks, nightmares or intrusive memories. This can feel very distressing.
  • Avoidance- efforts to avoid anything that reminds you of the trauma. This can mean refusing to walk past the hospital where you gave birth, or avoiding meeting other people with new babies. You might also avoid things like talking about birth, TV shows about birth, hospitals or medical visits
  • Feeling on edge- constantly feeling alert and jumpy. You may also have difficulty focusing on things or getting to sleep.
  • Difficult feelings and beliefs- feeling low, unsafe, anger, shame or guilt. You may feel guilty and blame yourself for your traumatic birth. You may also have feelings of shock and disbelief, failure, fear of something happening to you or baby, extreme exhaustion, depression, rage, suicidal thoughts, feelings of detachment, or emptiness.

How we can help

Birth trauma may resolve on its own or you may need some help with this. Psychological therapy can help with this. Once the referral is accepted by the service, an assessment will be completed. The clinician will then work with you to build a plan that suits your needs.

Types of therapy you may be offered include:

  • Trauma-focused CBT (Cognitive behavioural therapy) and/or EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing)- these are one-to-one therapy to help you to understand your experience, help you to feel safe and then help with processing the memories of the birth so that it can be thought about without causing distress.
  • A ‘Family and Friends’ session - often a partner or family member may have witnessed or also experienced your birth experience and its impact. They may find it hard to understand and need help with theirs and your distress.
  • Peer support work- this will involve getting support and simply talking to someone who may have had a similar experience to you in the past.
  • Trauma Stabilisation Group - this is a group therapy offering a range of methods, psychoeducation, and the opportunity to meet other women with similar needs and experiences to you.

Understanding fear of child birth

Understanding fear of child birth

Fear of childbirth or pregnancy is also known as tokophobia. It is a severe fear that can emerge even if a woman or birthing parent desires to have a baby. The fear can be present even where a woman or birthing parent has never given birth before or as is more common, where they have previously given birth, but had a previous traumatic experience of childbirth. This fear can significantly impact the overall pregnancy experience.

Dr Kirsty Harris discusses tokophobia (fear of child birth)

How we can help

There are many possible causes as to why this fear has developed and a number of different ways we can support you with this. Where a referral has been accepted by the service, following a assessment, an appropriate type of care will be taken and this can include:

  • Online webinars 
  • Individual therapy
  • A meeting with you, a psychologist or therapist and a specialist midwife to explain the full carre plan and make a plan tailored to your needs.
  • Organising a visit to the labour ward and/or meet the matron, if this would help alleviate your anxiety.
  • Education group about tokophobia. This will help you understand your fear of childbirth, develop helpful methods and meet other people with similar fears or experiences to you.

Mental health, learning disabilities and speciality services

  1. Acute Liaison Service and Psychiatry for Older Persons
  2. Adult ADHD, Autism and Tourette’s Team (AAATT)
  3. Adult Inpatients Acute
  4. Adult Inpatient Low Secure
  5. Adult Inpatient Specialist
  6. Adult Inpatient PICU
  7. At Risk Mental State Service
  8. Community Mental Health Adult - Early Intervention N’Step
  9. Community Mental Health Transformation
  10. Criminal Justice Liaison and Diversion Team
  11. Crisis cafés
  12. Crisis Houses: The Warren and The Martins
  13. Custody Healthcare Team
  14. Eating Disorders Service
  15. Forensic Team
  16. Gender Identity Clinic
  17. Health Based Place of Safety
  18. IPS Employment Service
  19. NHFT Talking Therapies
  20. Learning Disabilities
  21. Maternal Mental Health Service
  22. Memory Assessment Service
  23. Northants Personality Disorder Hub
  24. Older Adults Community Services
  25. Older People’s Inpatient Acute
  26. Peer support service
  27. Planned Care and Recovery Treatment Service
  28. Police Liaison & Triage
  29. Recovery College
  30. Secured Services
  31. Serenity Sexual Assault Referral Centre (SARC)
  32. Specialist perinatal mental health
  33. The Mental Health Number
  34. Urgent Care and Assessment Team
  35. Younger Persons with Dementia Team
  36. Neuromodulation (rTMS/ECT)