A new device designed to reduce traumatic labour has reached the clinical phase of its development.
Thanks to £1.5m funding from the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR), BirthGlide® will be used in Liverpool Women's Hospital later this year in a project led by Andrew Weeks, Professor of International Maternal Health at the University of Liverpool.
A first-time mother has about a 30% chance of encountering a complication in the second stage (pushing stage) of labour, requiring assisted delivery (forceps or suction delivery) or emergency caesarean section.
These procedures can not only be traumatic for the mother and baby but also come with risks of complications. Some, such as bleeding, tears, infection and pain, may be temporary, but others, like brain damage to the baby and maternal tearing, have lifelong effects. They are also expensive, requiring teams of specialists, additional theatre hours, and bed stays.
The BirthGlide team is developing a novel, simple-to-use device to reduce complications in the second stage of labour and the use of traumatic procedures. It works by reducing resistance between the baby's head and the birth canal. BirthGlide is a patent-protected device and could be used in the majority of the global 134 million births/year.
Professor Weeks, Professor of International Maternal Health at the University of Liverpool has worked alongside the BirthGlide team to secure £1.5m from the NIHR i4i Product Development Awards. This will fund the first-in-human feasibility study of the device.
Andrew Weeks, said: "This simple device has the potential to address a common, yet potentially avoidable, complication. We will be offering the device to 22 women in labour at Liverpool Women's Hospital next summer to see how acceptable it is, how easy it is to place correctly in the birth canal and whether it helps the baby to deliver.
"We hope that, if it is both acceptable and does actually help the baby to come through the birth canal, then we will move on to a much larger study to see how much it helps and whether it is cost-effective for the NHS to offer to every woman giving birth."
The NIHR Invention for Innovation (i4i) Programme is a translational research funding scheme aimed at medical devices, in vitro diagnostic devices and digital health technologies addressing an existing or emerging health or social care need.
