Maternity care in NSW

​​​​Connecting, listening and responding: A Blueprint for Action – Maternity Care in NSW

NSW Health published Connecting, Listening and Responding: A Blueprint for Action – Maternity Care in NSW (the Blueprint) in March 2023.

The Blueprint aims to strengthen maternity care to ensure care is collaborative, equitable and woman-centred.

The Blueprint is supported by 10 goals that were informed by what women told us matters most to them.

1. Women receive maternity care that is socially and culturally respectful.
2. The outcomes that matter to women, and their experiences, actively inform their maternity care and future service improvements.
3. Women have enough information before conception to optimise their health, pregnancy experience and outcomes.
4. Women are connected to information and care early in pregnancy.
5. Antenatal care reflects the individual preferences and needs of women, babies and families.
6. Women are offered different care options, are actively involved in decision-making about their care and their choices are respected.
7. Women with additional needs during pregnancy are connected to appropriate services.
8. Women are informed of the possible outcomes of all aspects of care during labour and birth.
9. Women receive safe, high quality, evidence-based care that is appropriate to their individual needs and expectations.
10. Women are connected to the care and support they need after birth.

The vision for maternity care in NSW

 ‘…that all women in NSW receive respectful, evidence-based and equitable maternity care that improves experiences and health and wellbeing outcomes’.

Implementing the Blueprint

NSW Health has started implementation of the Blueprint in collaboration with maternity clinicians and consumers. Local health districts and speciality health networks are using the Blueprint to:

• guide ongoing system reform and redesign to strengthen maternity care across NSW. This includes before pregnancy, pregnancy, labour, birth, postnatal care and transition to the community.
• inform direction and local actions to ensure all women in NSW receive respectful, evidence-based and equitable maternity care that improves experiences and health and wellbeing outcomes.

We are continuing to listen

NSW Health will continue to listen to and learn from women and their families, clinicians and other stakeholders to deliver the best possible maternity care for women, babies and families in NSW.

To support the implementation of Connecting, Listening and Responding: A Blueprint for Action – Maternity Care in NSW we’ve established:

• NSW Health Maternity Expert Advisory Group
• Announced by Minister Park on 9 September 2023
• Co-chaired by a consumer and the Deputy Secretary, Health System Strategy and Patient Experience.
• Membership includes midwifery and obstetric co-leads, consumers and senior leaders from the NSW Ministry of Health and pillars.
• Provides advice and makes recommendations to NSW Health on the implementation of the Blueprint priorities, considering consumer, clinical, service and system perspectives.
• NSW Health Maternity Consumer Reference Group
• Membership includes women and partners with a range of lived experience of maternity care in NSW within the last five years.
• Three self-nominated members sit on the Maternity Expert Advisory Group.
• Provides recommendations from a consumer perspective to the NSW Health Maternity Expert Advisory Group on the Blueprint implementation priorities.

Find out more

• To read about what we heard, and what we’re doing in response visit Implementing the Blueprint to improve maternity care in NSW.
• To read about how the Blueprint was developed, visit Developing t​he Blueprint to improve maternity care in NSW.