NLN Lauds New Study, Safer Births Bundle of Care, a Life-Saving Program for Reducing Maternal & Newborn Deaths

NLN Lauds New Study, Safer Births Bundle of Care, a Life-Saving Program for Reducing Maternal & Newborn Deaths

League Has Supported This Program from the Beginning, in Partnership with Laerdal Medical

Washington, DC — A groundbreaking study documenting a 40% reduction in early newborn death and a 75% reduction in maternal death following the implementation of the Safer Births Bundle of Care program in Tanzania was published recently in the venerated New England Journal of Medicine. The National League for Nursing is proud to have been an early supporter of the program in partnership with Laerdal Medical, a leader in health care simulation, technology, training, and clinical solutions.

Reports have shown that each year more than 300,000 women die of complications during pregnancy and childbirth and almost 3 million babies die during or soon after birth, nearly all in developing countries. Many are preventable, if birth attendants had the proper training and resources to manage many of the complications that arise around the time of delivery and birth.

Since the introduction of its life-saving birthing simulator and training tools, Laerdal Medical has sought to facilitate the acquisition of the technology by birthing centers in developing nations. The National League for Nursing has aided that effort, working with Laerdal Medical to promote a novel Buy-One-Gift-One program. For every Laerdal birthing simulator purchased in a high-income country, Laerdal Medical donates one to a low-income, under-resourced nation. The League has already helped provide more than 14,000 simulators to low-resource birthing centers that have been used to train tens of thousands of birth attendants.

“With Laerdal Medical, we have backed the Safer Births Bundle of Care program from the beginning, believing in its life-saving mission and in the power of simulation in medicine to make a dramatic difference in academic and clinical nursing education that increases access to quality patient care that heals individuals and communities,” said NLN Chair Patricia Sharpnack, DNP, RN, CNE, NEA-BC, ANEF, FAAN, Dean and Strawbridge Professor at the Breen School of Nursing and Health Professions at Ursuline College in Ohio.

“Each and every one of us is tied to a community of colleagues who are dedicated to healing, promotion of health, hope, and saving lives. By joining the Laerdal program, Buy-One-Gift-One, we all can make the difference in the lives of others in developing countries, who share the same values we do, but lack the resources. Let’s make that difference,” said NLN President and CEO Beverly Malone, PhD, RN, FAAN.

The League also provided an early platform to publicly showcase the program’s impressive success. In September 2024, Dr. Hege Langli Ersdal, the Norwegian anesthesiologist who was the lead investigator and co-authored the published study, presented the Plenary Lecture, Simulation Saves Lives, at the Opening Session of the 2024 NLN Education Summit in San Antonio, Texas. Dr. Ersdal went on to tell the Summit audience of nursing deans, faculty, students and allied health care professionals how the original program has been scaled up since it was first introduced to Tanzanian midwives.

The program now operates in 152 hospitals in diverse communities worldwide where it continues to positively impact maternal-newborn care. Today’s broad evidence-base shows sustained prevention of early death from delivery and post-delivery emergencies in busy, often under-resourced hospitals and clinics, Dr. Ersdal reported. 

A simulation-based clinical training solution, Safer Births Bundle of Care was developed over a decade of global research and collaboration between investigators and clinical teams to support physicians, midwives, nurse practitioners and other birth attendants to respond effectively to common day-of-delivery emergencies. The program tested high-frequency simulation-based individual and team training, utilizing specially designed innovative training and clinical tools, provided to the field by Laerdal Medical. 

In conjunction with the study’s recent publication in the New England Journal of Medicine, Dr. Ersdal, a professor on the faculty of Health Sciences at the University of Stavanger in Norway and head of research, simulation, and global health and leader of the Critical Care and Anesthesiology Research Group at Stavanger University Hospital, said, “With the Safer Births Bundle of Care, we have proven that it is possible to implement combined training and quality improvement efforts that lead to dramatic and sustained reductions in newborn and maternal deaths. I believe this marks a game-changing moment for women and newborns, everywhere.” 

The National League for Nursing and Laerdal Medical have long collaborated to co-create effective educational and faculty development initiatives. In 2025, Laerdal Medical will again sponsor the annual Debra Spunt Memorial Lecture at the NLN Education Summit in Orlando, Florida, September 17-19.

For more information, visit NLN.org.

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