Count the Kicks Prenatal Education
Monitoring your fetal movement in the third trimester.
Why you should track your baby’s movement in the third trimester
Monitoring your fetal movement can help you track what is normal in your third trimester of pregnancy. Tracking the movement is the best way to detect a change from the normal pattern. Research shows there is a link between fetal movement and a healthy baby. In fact, current research found a 30% reduction in stillbirths when women were taught to track fetal movement daily in the third trimester. This is why Milk It Lactation Services shares this important resource in all prenatal lactation visits.
Racial disparities with stillbirths
Parents of color experience stillbirths at a much higher rate than white parents.
"One out of every 169 pregnancies results in a stillbirth in the U.S." The rate of stillbirths is two times higher for Black expectant parents."
Black women are more than twice as likely to lose their babies to stillbirth than white women. The CDC estimates that 23,500 babies in the U.S. are born still each year, and nearly 7,000 of those babies are African American.
Milk It Lactation services aims to help reduce stillbirth health disparities Milk It Lactation Services is committed to reducing health care disparities and improving health equity in women of color. This is why Milk It includes count the kicks education and resources in our prenatal education.
How Count the Kicks is saving the lives of babies
Count the Kicks is an amazing organization with the mission to reduce stillbirths in the United States. They provide free evidence based resources for parents and providers.
If you want to learn more and read more about babies whose lives were saved from count the kicks please visit their Count the Kicks website. You can download the free Count the Kicks app for iOS and Android.
Count the Kicks has put together a step by step guide to start counting fetal kicks and movement at the start of the third trimester.
Step 1: Time- start a timer and record the time it takes for you to feel 10 movements
Step 2: Count- track movement at a time your baby is active around the same time each day.
Step 3: Pattern- after each counting session compare the movement count with the previous days.
Step 4: Contact- call your provider if you notice a significant change.
