Clinics in Mother and Child Health

Abstract

Providing Comfort Giving Support and Raising Awareness: Stillbirth Communication in Online Communities

Roxana Maiorescu

Currently there is little progress in reducing the number of stillbirths that occur worldwide and most of the causes leading to stillbirth remain undetermined. Further, outside of hospital settings, the parents of stillborn children are deprived of emotional comfort as a result of the discomfort the topic causes in their social interactions. Nonprofit organizations bear the responsibility to break the taboo around stillbirth, provide comfort to bereaved parents, and raise awareness and funds. For this purpose, these organizations can make use of social media platforms to create online communities. This paper draws on interpersonal communication theory to provide guidelines that nonprofit organizations can use to deliver comfort and raise awareness about stillbirth in online environments.