PERIBRAVE: Strengthening Community and Primary Care Support for Bereaved Families: Designing and Evaluating Interventions for Perinatal Loss

1/1/2025 to 31/12/2028
 

Background 

Annually about 50,000 Belgian families face perinatal loss (miscarriage, stillbirth or neonatal loss), causing distress for bereaved families and their support systems. Unfortunately, families often experience a lack of support, hindering coping ability. Instead of specialized care providers who have limited available time and resources, primary healthcare providers and community networks can play a crucial role in perinatal bereavement care. An interview study will identify primary care providers’ and community members’ needs in providing perinatal bereavement support. This will inform two interventions aiding primary care professionals (PERIBRAVE-PRO) and the community (PERIBRAVECOM) in supporting grieving parents. We'll use the Theory of Change Framework to design, implement, and evaluate our interventions, focusing on understanding social change processes. A stakeholder panel of primary care providers, community members and bereaved families will cocreate these interventions in workshops. They'll establish goals, determine tools, and implementation strategies tailored to end-users' needs, which will be tested and evaluated in one health care region aiming for a paradigm shift in perinatal bereavement, fostering community compassion and providing a replicable global model. Expected outcomes include robust support networks, empowered healthcarers, and scalable care frameworks. This project advances the growing importance of the public health palliative care approach.