The National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced in a press release that they are initiating the Stillbirth Research Consortium to help combat preventable stillbirths in the U.S. Members of the program will work to create pathways to the timely diagnosis and prevention of stillbirth.
The NIH has committed “$37 million over five years, pending the availability of funds” to the initiative, and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has committed $750,000. According to the NIH, more than half of stillbirths have unknown causes, and nearly 40% that happen during labor and birth “are considered potentially preventable.” The initiative will also aim to prevent stillbirth and other pregnancy complications in patients who have already experienced stillbirth.
There will be five components of The Stillbirth Consortium, according to the NIH:
- The Data Coordinating Center at RTI International, Research Triangle, North Carolina, that will focus on “development and implementation of common projects across the research centers and ensure rigor in study data and data sharing.”
- The University of California San Diego Center for Stillbirth Prevention Center that will focus on “identifying the causes of placental dysfunction that underlie fetal growth restriction and contribute to stillbirth.”
- The Collaborative Action for Research to End Stillbirth (CARES) Research Center at Columbia University, New York City, that will center on “electronic health records and artificial intelligence-aided analysis to develop automated algorithms specifically for early identification of stillbirth risk and to develop novel biomarkers of underlying placental dysfunction for predicting stillbirth.”
- The University of Utah Stillbirth Research Center that will “evaluate decreased fetal movement, stratification of stillbirth risk based on decreased fetal movement, and optimal strategies for managing it.”
- The Nutrition and Outcomes of Reproductive Injury and Stillbirth related Harms (NOURISH) Research Center at Oregon Health & Science University, Portland, will focus on “the role of nutrition, chronic stress, cardiometabolic health, and placental dysfunction to identify promising interventions aimed at reducing preventable stillbirth.”
