The OCEAN is a new maternal mental health service, run by East London NHS Foundation Trust, available for people living in City & Hackney, Newham and Tower Hamlets. Offering compassionate and emotional support for those living through birth trauma and loss, it is designed for people who are experiencing moderate to severe psychological distress. The OCEAN team is led by psychologists working with midwives and is separate to the perinatal mental health teams.

Read more about what the service offers, details of the therapeutic programme, how people can be referred and contact details.

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Eligibility criteria

Inclusions

OCEAN is a service for people who are experiencing moderate to severe psychological distress that meets the criteria of a secondary mental health service, for the following reasons (please note mild-moderate presentations should still be seen in IAPT).

• Loss including miscarriage, medical termination, neonatal death or stillbirth;
• Traumatic birth experience;
• Traumatic perinatal experience. This may include assisted pregnancy or IVF issues:
• Because of a perinatal experience owing to their identification as LGBTQ+
• Owing to a significant fear or phobia related specifically to pregnancy and childbirth,  for example fear of giving birth, undergoing examinations;
• Owing to parent-infant separation taking place during the first year after birth due to children’s  social care involvement

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How to refer

The following clinicians can refer to this service:

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External Links