A new resource on healthtalk.org for parents who lost a baby at 20-24 weeks of pregnancy will launch tomorrow.

A baby who dies after 24 weeks of pregnancy is considered stillborn and their birth and death can be registered. The experiences of parents who lose their baby in the 20-24 week window of pregnancy are no less devastating but the experience is technically termed a ‘miscarriage’.

The resource will be introduced to health professionals at MBRRACE Perinatal Mortality Surveillance Report Meeting on Friday 15 June by Dr Lisa Hinton from the University of Oxford and Dr Lucy Smith from the University of Leicester, who led the research.

Dr Lisa Hinton, from Oxford University, said: ‘To call these losses a miscarriage does not adequately describe the traumatic experience that parents go through. We hope that the website will give parents who lose a baby at this late stage of pregnancy support through reading about the experiences of others.’

Dr Lucy Smith, an NIHR Career Development Fellow from the University of Leicester, said: ‘The experience of losing a baby is devastating but the impact of losing a baby just before the legal stillbirth registration limit of 24 weeks is rarely recognised.”

See parents share their experiences of losing a baby at 20-24 weeks of pregnancy.