The Reproductive Justice Story Project is a grassroots patient advocacy organization. We exist to bring attention to mistreatment and abuse within our healthcare system as a result of a culture that is not always patient-centred and does not always prioritize communication, informed decision-making, and consent.
We’re using our platform to speak up about disrespectful and abusive care during pregnancy, childbirth, postpartum, and while accessing other forms of reproductive healthcare in Ontario, Canada in order to hold harmful systems accountable and influence change across the province.
If you have a personal story to share about reproductive healthcare you've received in Ontario, consider sharing it for our Community Story Blog.
Our Community Story Blog launched in January 2018 to serve as a public body of evidence of the range of issues faced by patients today.
It's clear the lack of access to respectful, inclusive, patient-centred care affects patients across demographic lines. However, marginalized populations are disproportionately impacted including Indigenous, Black, and people of colour, young people, fat folks, those living on low incomes, with disabilities, whose first language is not that of their care providers, those with diverse gender expression or presentation, less conventional family structures, mental health or trauma histories, and many others.
Research shows that racialized populations lack access to culturally safe care, face implicit bias and overt discrimination from care providers and health systems, and even experience higher rates of complications and infant/maternal mortality as a result. The intergenerational impacts of settler-colonial violence on the reproductive health and rights of Indigenous communities in Canada are omnipresent; from forced and coerced sterilizations, to high rates of Indigenous children in care across the country.
Barriers also exist for LGBTQIA2+ identified individuals and families seeking out and accessing quality care. For two-spirit, trans, non-binary, agender, and gender non-conforming people, care providers and care settings that are truly inclusive and gender-affirming are still scarce in most communities.
Reproductive Justice is about much more than the freedom to plan our own families. It's about dignity, autonomy, and self-determination in all stages of our reproductive lives.
Though the medical community is slow to change, we believe that change can happen if we all speak up together!
Our next planned initiative, an Ontario-wide survey on traumatic childbirth, is currently in the works.
The results of our independent patient feedback survey for St. Joseph's Health Centre, Toronto are now available:
content note: the community story blog contains subject matter that may bring up difficult feelings for some readers. please practice self-care while reading and check out our page of resources if you need support
![Last month, the World Health Organization launched their new guidelines for care during childbirth. "The guideline contains 56 evidence-based recommendations detailing the clinical and non-clinical care that is needed throughout labour and immediately afterwards for [birthers] and for newborns. One of the key new recommendations in this guideline recognizes that every labour is unique and that they do not all progress at the benchmark rate of 1 cm/hour of cervical dilatation. This benchmark rate has been used for decades and on a partograph alerts the birth attendant that labour is progressing abnormally when it is not achieved. In recognizing that this rate of dilatation may be unrealistic for some [birthing people], the guideline recommends that this factor alone should not be a routine indication for medical intervention to accelerate labour or expedite birth. WHO anticipates that this new recommendation will help to substantially reduce the growing rate of unnecessary caesarean sections that has currently reached an epidemic proportion." .
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The second two infographics have been edited for inclusive language. Feel free to repost! View the originals and read the report here: http://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/intrapartum-care/en/
#worldhealthorganization #childbirth #pregnancy #birthstory #birthjustice #reproductivejustice #evidencebased #patientcentred #informedchoice](https://static1.squarespace.com/static/593fbf68d2b857a8ca81d418/5a7763afbff200287e18c460/5b3c4bc8ddff691143580c0e/1530678217618/)
![Pregnancy & birth can be tough - even for birthers without a history of trauma. "Fortunately, [healthcare providers] don’t need the admission of abuse to employ strategies developed for survivors." Here are some tips for care providers from the AWHONN Blog. What else would you add to the list? -Explain as much as you can in advance -Always start with asking permission -Go slowly with everything you do -Limit vaginal exams -Minimize people in the room
from "PROVIDING CARE FOR SURVIVORS OF SEXUAL ABUSE DURING CHILDBIRTH"
by Tasha Poslaniec August 24, 2017 https://awhonnconnections.org/2017/08/24/providing-care-for-survivors-of-sexual-abuse-during-childbirth/
If you've experienced disrespectful or abusive treatment from healthcare providers anywhere in Ontario during pregnancy, childbirth, or postpartum - including pregnancy & infant loss and abortion - consider sharing your story on our blog. Link in bio.
#birthtrauma #birthjustice #obstetricviolence #reproductivejustice #consent #traumainformed #metoointhebirthroom #Ontario #Canada](https://static1.squarespace.com/static/593fbf68d2b857a8ca81d418/5a7763afbff200287e18c460/5b3c4bc8ddff691143580c0f/1530678217707/)
We would like to respectfully acknowledge that the land on which The Reproductive Justice Story Project is based in Tkaronto (Toronto) is the traditional territory of the Wendat, the Anishnaabek, Haudenosaunee, Métis, and the Mississaugas of the New Credit. We acknowledge the intergenerational impacts of settler-colonial violence and their implications on Indigenous reproductive health, rights, and justice - historically and into the present day.