Industrial Design| Research

reBIRTH

This project is a group entry for the James Dyson Award in 2020 where it won as the Philippine National Winner. It highlights the design of a woman-centered birthing tool that helps accommodate a variety of birthing positions for a positive birthing experience.

PROGRESSION

The Challenge

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There is a considerable lack of maternal health innovations in the Philippines that leave birthing beds and tools designed often with the health practitioner in mind, and not the mother. Birthing beds that exist in the Philippines are either too simple that it basically is a flat surface to lie down on or complex metallic mechanisms that intimidate mothers alike especially those coming from far-flung rural areas.

How might we design a tool that helps empower mothers in labor to take charge in creating their own positive birthing experience?

Process

Interviews with mothers and health practitioners in rural areas

The usual design of obstetric beds forces the mother in labor to lie down on her back, inconsistent with the natural physiology of labor. The team has interviewed health care practitioners from rural areas and mothers with experience in natural birth to better understand the problem being designed for.

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Online interviews with healthcare practitioners from rural areas were done to capture the in-context scene we were trying to investigate. This helped us empathize with what mothers giving birth and doctors in such far-flung and geographically isolated areas are experiencing: very little resources, distant trips from people’s homes to a healthcare unit, and natural birth as the primary birth delivery method.

Being able to talk with mothers who have underwent natural birth was insightful to know that the tools, environments, and initial perception all affected how they had felt before even getting on the obstetric beds to give birth.

Insights

Discussions with healthcare practitioners and mothers yielded the following:

  • Women during childbirth feel disempowered and have no sense of control over their own bodies.
  • Today’s obstetric beds in the Philippines are designed more for the medical practitioner than for the mother, are intimidating for mothers, and do not support the natural physiology of birthing.
  • In some indigenous Filipino cultures, women give birth on the floor instead of on a bed, others give birth while squatting instead of lying down, as part of their culture and beliefs.

Pain points with current tools

The following were synthesized from all the conversations had with birthing mothers and healthcare practitioners in rural settings in the Philippines:

  • Lack of accommodation for a variety of birthing positions
  • Uncomfortable materials
  • Complex mechanisms
  • Intimidating design
  • Expensive for rural health units to procure

World Health Organization Recommendation

“It is important that any particular position is not forced on the woman and that she is encouraged and supported to adopt any position that she finds most comfortable.”

— W.H.O. Recommendations: intrapartum care for a positive childbirth experience (2018)

The WHO recommendations for intrapartum care for a positive childbirth experience (2018) has been a pivotal resource in this project. This resource had been brought to light to the team by a maternal health innovations expert we had conversed with.

Design

The team, comprised of engineering and design students, took into consideration the variety of positions a mother may choose in any stage of labor which resulted in the tool having three components that allows it to be reconfigured accordingly and without sacrificing the mother’s comfort.

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Its interior is made of two layers of foam: coconut coir for support and polyurethane for comfort, both of which are easy to procure and replace when they deteriorate. Its exterior will be covered by waterproof olefin fabric for ease of cleaning.

Re-configurable design

Its default configuration encourages an upright labor position which can be done using the stool or via the flip-in-and-out part. The C-shaped stool is designed as the passageway of the baby and the mother’s discharge, while the flippable part can serve as a wedge or a backrest. 

The other mode caters to birthing positions such as kneeling, lying, side-lying, and semi-inclined through a roll-out mattress. The simple configurations of reBIRTH make it easy to use while catering to a wide variety of birthing positions.

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Accommodates multiple labor positions

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reBIRTH enables mothers to give birth in the position of their choice. Its multiple configurations support a variety of upright & lying down birthing positions. It makes labor more comfortable and less painful than when done on current obstetric beds.

Conclusion

reBIRTH allows for a variety of birthing positions to mothers in labor, thus empowering her to choose her preferred position, even giving birth on the floor on the mat should she want. Its simple design encourages her to find the best configuration for her in any stage of labor. Its absence of metal contraptions makes it look less intimidating to first-time mothers.

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Reflections

Having done this project during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic was challenging as every person in our team had been scattered throughout the country. Despite this fact, doing this project taught me how to work in a team setting and how to work with non-designers which allowed me to learn how to communicate my thoughts and ideas in a multi-disciplinary team setting.

Not only was it an incredible experience to be working with fellow teammates from different disciplines, but it was also an amazing experience to be able to talk with actual healthcare practitioners in rural areas to gain their insights and recommendations for our project’s direction. This has taught me to look beyond what is on a written research report and go talk to people in the field with lived experiences of whatever you might be trying to solve from afar.

© Erik Asia 2024