Saving babies' lives.
Supporting bereaved families.

Together, #WeAreSands

Sands Impact 2022-2023

Welcome

After launching our strategy in March 2022 where we outlined Sands’ vision to create a world where fewer babies die and where anyone affected receives the best possible care and support for as long as they need, this year we focused on delivering work that would help us achieve this. 

Key to achieving our vision is the understanding that we can’t do this alone. When we work collaboratively and bring together our skills, expertise and experiences, we can do so much more.

Working together with our wonderfully committed local Sands groups across the UK, and with our volunteers, campaigners and fundraisers, we have made such a difference. We have done everything from creating much-needed reports and recommendations to improve maternity safety, to calling for and winning campaigns about better training for healthcare professionals and a commitment for more midwives to be recruited to the NHS. We have also grown our local peer-to-peer support and expanded our online support, and now more people can access Sands and all we offer in a way that works for them.

Thank you to everyone who has been a part of this work, Together We Are Sands, and together we can save babies’ lives and support bereaved families.

Clea Harmer, Chief Executive, Sands

Clea Harmer, Chief Executive Sands
The year in numbers
779304 people accessed our pregnancy and baby loss support, and our safer pregnancy advice
224 volunteer-led support services in communities across the UK, including 90 monthly support groups and 39 Sands United Football Clubs
20504 employees reached through workplace training
6652 training and learning opportunities for healthcare professionals
5890 e-actions sent by campaigners to elected representatives and decision makers
90 research studies supported
Building an inclusive accessible community
Building an inclusive accessible community
"Pregnancy loss and baby death affect the lives of over half of adults in the UK. Yet it can be a lonely, isolating experience. The Sands community walks alongside anyone affected by this loss. We provide support that puts each person's individual needs front and centre in a way that endeavours to respect differences, to make sure everyone feels comfortable seeking support at any point during their grief journey. By making space for personal stories we aim to give bereaved parents and families a sense of understanding and community.” 
Jen Coates, Director of Bereavement Support and Volunteering, Sands

Welcoming everyone who
needs our support

Extending support within Black and South Asian communities
Bereaved parents in Black and South Asian communities, where baby loss rates are some of the highest, also tell us of stigma, taboo and isolation. That's why we introduced more online support groups for Black and South Asian families, providing a safe space for shared understanding and support for people like Vanisha.

Group of South Asian mothers having a discussion
"In sharing the nuances of baby loss in our shared culture (faith, extended family/community and shame),... my own experience was better reflected and felt more understood."
Vanisha, bereaved mum reflecting on our monthly support groups

Improving support for speakers of languages other than English
Translating our Bereavement Support Book into nine languages has made a vital resource accessible to more parents whose baby may die or whose baby has already died.

Making support more accessible for everyone
A new 'easy read' version of our Bereavement Support Book helps guide people with limited literacy or living with learning disabilities through this difficult time. 

Parent holding a Bereavement Support Book

Compassionate support for parents choosing to end pregnancy for medical reasons
After hearing from parents who made the difficult decision to end their pregnancy and were unsure about available support, we have added more information about termination for medical reasons (TFMR) in the Bereavement Support Book. Parents experiencing this challenging situation told us they often feel judged at a time that's already frightening and can be lonely. Sands strives to support everyone experiencing pregnancy and baby loss in all circumstances.

Proactively bringing people to Sands

Reaching bereaved parents wherever they are
Many parents feel that meeting others who have experienced the death of a baby can offer real understanding. But sometimes it might not be possible for them to attend a Sands local support group or they may feel more comfortable talking about their experience online or from their own home. Our online meetings are a valuable source of support for any bereaved parent, and they’ve been set up to provide support in a way parents tell us works best for them. That’s why we’ve added separate groups especially for men, Black parents and families and parents and families from South Asian communities.

Two men kneeling and placing pinwheels into the ground.

Putting people's needs first

Helping parents care for their baby in a way that fits with their faith
Alongside our Memory Boxes, we introduced Muslim Care Boxes which include faith-specific items. Bereaved parents tell us their baby will always be a part of their family, and Sands Memory and Care Boxes are a special place to keep meaningful items collected before and after saying goodbye to their babies. The boxes and their contents help the parental bond live on and make sure their baby is forever part of the family's story.

Image showing the contents of the Muslim Care Box.

Evolving how and where we work for the biggest impact possible
Sands' work in local communities continues to gain momentum. Recognising Sands must grow and change to meet the needs of bereaved parents, we're altering and increasing support for families. While continuing to work at local and national levels across all four nations, we're also prioritising geographical areas and higher-risk groups.

Our campaigners are crucial to raising awareness of the status quo for some families and bringing about change, so we ran a survey of our campaigners to understand more about how they’d like to be involved. We have since established a campaigners’ e-newsletter to bring them closer to our work. Over two-thirds told us they would like to share their story to inform our campaigns and 50% are willing to contribute to materials. We are very grateful to the nearly 1,000 campaigners who shared their views to help us develop our campaigning.

Raising awareness of our cause and work

Baby Loss Awareness Week 2022
Stopping isolation in its tracks and making understanding and support for bereaved parents more forthcoming means breaking the silence around pregnancy loss and baby death. Alongside Sands, over 120 like-minded organisations came together for this year's Baby Loss Awareness Week. Together, we raised the conversation around baby death and created a space for bereaved parents, families and others to remember their babies, share experiences and feel supported.

Kelpies lit up Pink & Blue during Baby Loss Awareness Week.

Image Credit: atpwiles1968

Image Credit: atpwiles1968

Highlights of Baby Loss Awareness Week. The campaign received over 1770 media mentions, more than ever before. Sands was mentioned 237 times in the media. Sands & Bauer Media radio partnership resulted in over 40 mentions across local radio and associated online news, websites, including interviews with Sands staff and six bereaved parents who have been supported by Sands.

Together, we're helping bereaved parents find comfort in shared experiences.

"It's a good feeling to know that along the way with events like Baby Loss Awareness Week, we're helping others too."
Annika, bereaved mum to Gypsy
Baby Loss Tree with Pink & Blue ribbons during Baby Loss Awareness Week.
100181 Baby Loss Awareness Week page views. 72.6 million people reached via the media. 3.8 million people reached via Sands-specific media.
Bereaved mother holding a teddy bear from a memory box

Sands Awareness Month 2022

Together, #We Are Sands

Sands is a powerful community. And together, we save babies' lives and support bereaved families. This year, we helped the Sands community connect with others so more people understand the impact of baby loss, why Sands exists and what we do.

Sands Instagram Feed during Sands Awareness Month.

The community told us about their #MySandsConnection, shared their stories, attended Sands Garden Day alongside other bereaved families, fundraised with family and friends, donated to support our work and chose to become volunteers.

Families walking together during Sands Garden Day.
Together, #We Are Sands. 8 Stories shared in the media. 1.3 million people reached with Together, #We Are Sands. 4,800 views of the Together, #We Are Sands video. 858 dedications in the Sands Digital Summer Garden.

Amie’s #MySandsConnection
Amie’s daughter Charlotte was stillborn at 37 weeks in 2015. She found the care she was given by the hospital at the time helped her and her partner on their bereavement journey and has gone on to set up a Sands support group in her home town.

"My immediate bereavement care was excellent. I was taken great care of when delivering my daughter and had lots of memory making opportunities with her following her birth.

However, my bereavement care once I left hospital was just a few phone calls from the bereavement midwife but otherwise nothing. Counselling lists were at least six month waiting lists. So I found and used the Sands forums, my family and good friends as my support.”
Amie, bereaved mum to Charlotte
Pinwheels during the Sands Garden Day event.
Families placing pinwheels during the Sands Garden Day Remembrance Event.
Saving babies' lives
Saving babies' lives
"Many baby deaths could be prevented through investing in research and standards of care. That’s why we support pioneering research, drive improvements in maternity safety and work to reduce inequalities to make the UK the safest place in the world to have a baby. Parent voices and lived experiences inform that research, shape our campaigns and sit at the heart of our education and training, leading to better care and fewer babies dying.”
Kate Mulley, Director of Research, Education and Policy, Sands

Collaborating and learning

Together, we're making change possible.

"Input from Sands is invaluable. It helps ground research in real-life experiences of women, links results to other projects and researchers and undoubtedly plays an important role in dissemination and adoption of results."
Raya, researcher at Newcastle University

Strengthening research for the biggest impact on saving babies' lives
We supported over 90 research studies, working with researchers, healthcare and care professionals to understand more about why babies die, to make care safer and to improve support after loss. From input into research funding applications to developing and designing studies and facilitating bereaved parents sharing their experiences, we continue to invest our expertise in research that puts bereaved parents’ voices at its heart, to make the biggest difference to parents and families.  

Demonstrating the impact of research studies and parents’ voice
With an expanding portfolio of research studies, we built a new system that closely tracks the progress and impact of all the research we support. This ensures we are focusing on high-quality studies that make the biggest difference and makes it possible to showcase where parents' voices are contributing to the evidence base.

Via our website you can see in an instant all the research we support and find details about the difference we’re making in the areas of most interest to you, whether it’s around environmental factors that may impact baby deaths, or the support that bereaved fathers and partners may need in the workplace.

Examples of some research projects:

i-choose project
We amplified parents’ voices by making it possible for them to feed into a research project whose aim was to agree what key aspects of parents' experiences need to be measured in all research related to bereavement care after stillbirth.

DISCERN study
The study aimed to understand what would improve open disclosure to harmed families when things go wrong in NHS maternity care. When units are not honest about poor care it can compound parents' experience of harm. As a collaborator on the study led by King's College London, Sands has ensured parents' experiences are captured at every stage of the study. We also consulted on an animation which will be included in training on open disclosure conversations and processes for healthcare professionals.

Learning from parents’ perspectives about why their baby died
For many parents the most pressing question when their baby dies is why? Understanding what happened is key for them, and for services to improve. By learning from when things go wrong, we can work with healthcare professionals to ensure care is improved before, during and after pregnancy. So we have focused our efforts on ensuring parents' voices about what happened are included in any review, to get a 360-degree view of their care to understand if safer, more personalised care might have saved their baby. Through a free 90-minute webinar, we trained up to 30 healthcare professionals every month. From chaplains to student midwives and neonatologists, we guided them in engaging and communicating with bereaved parents about the review process. Thanks to our work as a key member of the Perinatal Mortality Review Tool (PMRT) - the UK's national system for reviewing care - we were able to highlight that at least two deaths a day might be avoided with safer, more personalised care.

Bereaved mother holding a cup of tea.
Since the training was launched the number of parents who know about the review has doubled from 44% to 78%. Those offered the opportunity to share their perspectives of their care through a 360-degree review of what happened has increased from 25% to 64%.

Parent insight guiding our future focus
Parents' voices shape our work, from the training and education for healthcare professionals to policy changes and our research focus. Making sure their voices are heard and lessons are learnt from their experience also gives bereaved parents the chance to leave a lasting legacy for their baby. The newly established Sands Insights Core Group brings together bereaved parents who use their experience and knowledge to influence where our focus should be for the biggest impact and what we need to do to create a wider, more inclusive parent network.

“The Insights parents helped to shape an evidence-based framework for health professionals’ education, setting out the skills and competencies they’ll need to learn about to deliver good bereavement care.

We also made sure the parent's voice was heard as part of a national data collection programme in collaboration with MBRRACE (Mothers and Babies: Reducing Risk through Audits and Confidential Enquiries across the UK), making it a priority to highlight places where there may be concerns about care safety. Through our input, we keep a focus on ensuring the data is used to reduce baby deaths."
Janet Scott, Joint Head of Saving Babies’ Lives, Sands

Adding parents' voices to the crisis in perinatal pathology
There is an acute shortage of perinatal pathologists in the UK. As a result some bereaved parents are waiting more than six months to find out why their baby died and most baby post-mortems are taking over three months. Parents are left in limbo, unable to move on with their grief and without the information they need to plan another pregnancy. By raising strong concerns with policymakers and service providers at multiple levels in England, we have pushed hard to ensure parents’ needs are included in service changes and that information and training provision for healthcare professionals around baby post-mortems is addressed. By making parents’ voices heard, we’re highlighting the real impact of the current crisis in perinatal pathology. We continue to work on this issue to change outcomes for more families.