More than 60% of pregnant women worry they are wasting midwives’ time so they don’t ask about their health concerns, according to research from BabyCentre.
In response, the Always Ask campaign was started in hopes it will empower pregnant women to overcome fears of asking health professionals questions.
Endorsed by the Royal College of Midwives (RCM), it is designed to reduce the number of women who have serious pregnancy complications or a loss which could have been prevented if they had consulted a professional sooner.
RCM chief executive Cathy Warwick said: ‘Ensuring women know when to speak up and be able to do so is critical to delivering high quality maternity services. This campaign will help ensure that women and their midwives are better able to work in partnership to achieve that.'
The campaign centres around two animations voiced by midwife, mother and Instagram personality Clemmie Hooper, whose followers number in the hundreds of thousands.
She said: ‘As a midwife, I would always rather someone come and see me ten times and it be a false alarm, rather than miss someone the one time they really need to be seen. I hope we can encourage women to speak up.’