Midwives told to stop using terms such as 'breastfeeding' and 'breastmilk'

[MissMoped]

because it’s not gender inclusive language, I believe with particular reference to the transexual debate.

This is at Brighton and Sussex nhs trust btw, good to know NHS money is being spent wisely btw, poring over the “incorrect” use of language.

The word “mother” apparently should not be used on its own; instead “mother or birthing parent” (um, isn’t that a mother?).

Breast milk and breastfeeding is to be replace by “breast/chest milk” or “milk from the feeding parent”. “Woman” should be replaced with “woman or person”.

Gobsmacked.

Its baffling isnt it Impatiens?

patient group after patient group - people with autism, people with learning difficulties, people with mental health problems - have been fobbed off with meaningless platitudes and a promise to do better on inclusion for years

but TRA ask and all anyone asks is "how high?"

Op:

I hope they continue using the terms. They are the correct ones. Where us this craziness going to end?

Where is...

It’s a case of the tail wagging the dog. The majority should have precedence.

NiceGerbil the word is pregnant women rather than patients.

It has nothing to do with not respecting the needs of pregnant women on public transport and everything to do with normalising birth rather than pathologising it.

When births happened at home, attended by a midwife there was no medicalisation of the process. That began in the middle of the last century and lead to unnecessary interventions and frequently to obstetric violence.

There was a grassroots movement by mothers and supported by midwives to reclaim pregnancy and birth and to demedicalise it, part of that was avoiding the word patient in relation to pregnant and birthing women.

A pregnant woman is not sick, she can be strong, healthy and well.

I know the midwife who wrote this policy (albeit not well). This isn’t about replacing any language already in use, but knowing which words you might use when talking to certain groups. Brighton has a higher than average number of LGBTQ+ families so it makes sense that the language needs to be available to reflect that.

Whether it makes much sense that you can be so distressed by your biological identity that you need to live your life as a different gender, but can come to terms with it enough to go through pregnancy and childbirth, is a whole other argument that I’m struggling to understand myself. But it’s not my life and it’s not my experience.

it’s using made up biologically inaccurate terms.

And in a small number of cases where people suffer from things like phobia or mental illness that may be appropriate. I’m also thinking of the kind of things described in the book ‘the man who mistook his wife for a hat’. I’m not advocating for the NHS to use hat inclusive language generally...

patient group after patient group - people with autism, people with learning difficulties, people with mental health problems - have been fobbed off with meaningless platitudes and a promise to do better on inclusion for years

Yep. And almost all other areas of care in fact - the NHS has been in crisis for years, year after year of worsening stats long before covid.

To me this is analogous to the Police - who constantly highlight lack of funds/lack of recruitment as reasons for their inability to attend or properly investigate serious incidents. But fly the Trans Pride flag from the Station building/get staff to wear rainbow patches and lanyards/log a 'hate speech' incident for someone who upset a trans activist on twitter - no problem!

But reduced capacity is entirely different. In those incidences the decisions may be left to the next of kin or someone with POA.

When you are talking about misleading patient who have full capacity they surely need to be fully ajd accurately informed.

What happens when a patient complains and it comes out that they were given advice based on made up terms with no medical relevance then that puts staff in dodgy position surely?

I agree, my argument is about reduced capacity.

What happens when a patient complains and it comes out that they were given advice based on made up terms with no medical relevance then that puts staff in dodgy position surely?

Maybe? I don’t know.

Brighton has a higher than average number of LGBTQ+ families so it makes sense that the language needs to be available to reflect that.
I think what would make sense would be for maternity services to make it clear that the reason they use sex based language is because pregnancy and child birth are sex based functions.
I don't think mashing up the language of sex and gender identity makes any sense, however good your intentions might be.

However, I think the line between reduced capacity and not being able to take decisions about care is rarely clear.

Whether it makes much sense that you can be so distressed by your biological identity that you need to live your life as a different gender, but can come to terms with it enough to go through pregnancy and childbirth, is a whole other argument that I’m struggling to understand myself. But it’s not my life and it’s not my experience

I don't think anyone here has argued that gender dysphoric patients, service users or clients shouldn't have sensitive one to one care.

But I'd be interested to know why the policy and wording were coupled with a thread of disciplinary action for accidental incorrect terminology.

Are policies on social and ethnic inclusion or potentially misogynistic language similar coupled with threats of disciplinaries if staff accidentally use the wrong term?

Do they also support gaslighting of female patients to "educate" victims of abuse or the cognitively impaired not to be bigots when they want female bodied care? Again its not just the one paragraph, the one statement about "being kind" or "being sensitive" its the creeping totality of erasing the significance of sex and replacing it with a social construct.

@merrymouse

it’s using made up biologically inaccurate terms.

And in a small number of cases where people suffer from things like phobia or mental illness that may be appropriate. I’m also thinking of the kind of things described in the book ‘the man who mistook his wife for a hat’. I’m not advocating for the NHS to use hat inclusive language generally...

I don’t understand your point in the context that we are discussing. We are not talking about people with phobia, mental illness, dementia or in end of life. Not that HCP use made up terms in any of these contexts that I’ve ever been aware of either.

However, I think the line between reduced capacity and not being able to take decisions about care is rarely clear

Extra complicated I guess when you start from a point of someone who is dysphoric about their body and identifies as something other than what they are biologically, has no limitations on thwor capacity. I should think that alters the bar position quite considerably. And maybe worryingly so

We are not talking about people with phobia, mental illness, dementia or in end of life

I don't know whether the difference between dysphoria and phobia is that clear in an individual patience context. Also, there does seem to be an overlap with mental illness.

Not that HCP use made up terms in any of these contexts that I’ve ever been aware of either.

Not made-up, but certainly not accurate. There is a lot of glossing over, depending on who is receiving the information.

In real life the lines aren't so clear.

Trans people have led a sustained campaign with the message that not all trans people are dysphoric, and that transgenderism and dysphoria is not a mental illness.
So either this is true, in which case why are we using made up words to appease them, as they know perfectly well that it is their breasts feeding their baby, or it’s not true in which we definitely shouldn’t be using made up words to confuse them even further.
Bottom line, a national health organisation has a responsibility to use biologically accurate language. There may be instances were their message is difficult, sensitive or nuanced @merrymouse but you’ve not given me any examples of any other instance where biologically incorrect terms would be legitimately use in the NHS, and with my own experience in a family of HCP I can’t think of any either.

Trans people have led a sustained campaign with the message that not all trans people are dysphoric, and that transgenderism and dysphoria is not a mental illness.

Yes, but the existence of gender wang does not mean that gender dysphoria doesn't exist, or that it isn't related to mental illness. Health care providers should treat the patient not the politics.

...it’s not true in which we definitely shouldn’t be using made up words to confuse them even further.

That isn't really how it works when treating patients in real life.

There may be instances were their message is difficult, sensitive or nuanced @merrymouse but you’ve not given me any examples of any other instance where biologically incorrect terms would be legitimately use in the NHS, and with my own experience in a family of HCP I can’t think of any either.

I don't want to share details on the internet, but can only conclude that our experiences are different.

Trans people have led a sustained campaign

Some trans people.

A health care provider is not treating a campaign. They are treating the patient in front of them.

A health care provider is not treating a campaign. They are treating the patient in front of them

Yes they are, however they are being told to not provide the same level of care and safeguarding to one set of patients

Openness, honesty, clarity- all over NHS/NICE guidelines. Even when it comes to truth-telling for example in end of life for vulnerable patients. In real life there is nuance, empathy etc, but any HCP who was saying something patently untrue would be opening themselves up legally.

Chest-feeding is a false and confusing representation of how a mother feeds her newborn baby.

Given the case in the uk where a transman has attempted to twice and been refused twice , be documented as their babies father on the birth certificate,

Could it be that should staff be investigated if there is a bad outcome somewhere along the line, that legally the buck stops with them?. If legal agencies higher up have enticed laws/regulations that are different to policies and regulations the staff members followed, what's the legal consequences of that situation? How do they prove they gave accurate and detailed medical information based on affirming the.identities of the patient when legally transmen are still recognised as the mother

Could it be that should staff be investigated if there is a bad outcome somewhere along the line, that legally the buck stops with them?

I don't know.

I also have to admit that I am assuming an idealised model of one to one patient care as depicted in 'Call the Midwife'. The reality is different doctors hurriedly reading notes that may be incomplete.

Incomplete and possibly inaccurate. I could well imagine that in an.emergency pronouns etc will just be mixed up etc because there's not time to stop and think amd tell yourself to not say what you see.

If the staff effectively have no legal back up despite being threatened with their jobs for messing up with this then its really unfair on them.

I mean it might well be that the higher powers have also been trained the sake way etc but we do know that SW law isn't actual law, that there are protected characteristics etc that can't just be re defined and re decided on individual requirements. I think the hospital owes the staff a full check as to their insurance and status if sued/disciplined etc

Given the case in the uk where a transman has attempted to twice and been refused twice , to be documented as their babies father on the birth certificate

Just as well the NHS isn't in charge of registering births as no doubt they'd be falling over themselves to give in to that falsehood as well. The courts seem to be one of the few little islands of sanity left at the moment.