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A London hospital is to open the UK’s first maternity clinic specifically designed for rape survivors.

The specialist service has been developed in response to women saying they experienced flashbacks of being assaulted while undergoing routine maternity tests and giving birth.

The clinic at the Royal London Hospital will provide specialist gynaecological exams and mental health support after labour. Antenatal classes have also been tailored to those who have experienced sexual assault, while women who are not yet pregnant can access pre-conception care.

It is a joint initiative from Barts Health NHS Trust and the My Body Back project.

Pavan Amara, a 28-year-old student nurse, founded My Body Back in 2015 after being raped as a teenager herself. It runs support groups in the capital for women who have been raped.

“In our sessions, a lot of women said they wanted a baby, but they couldn’t face people touching them and they were worried they’d experience flashbacks and would feel totally out of control of their body,” says Ms Amara. “A woman who had a baby already - about 15 years after being gang-raped - felt when she gave birth that there were lots of parallels, with lots of people standing around her, and the doctor put his hand into her vagina - that was somebody taking away her right to consent again.”

She adds that words and body positions can be “triggering” for victims of sexual assualt. “A clinician told one woman to ‘relax because it would be over sooner’ and it was hard for her because that’s what her rapist had kept telling her. Certain body positions can also remind women of what happened. And a lot of women felt that after they were pregnant, all that mattered was the baby’s health, and no one was talking to the Mum about what made them feel comfortable. You become just a vagina to give birth but mentally they were dealing with all of this."

A 37-year-old rape survivor, who had a baby two years ago, said: “I was given gas and air while in labour and I started hallucinating, seeing the man who had attacked me in the room. I managed to articulate what was happening to my husband, but he wasn’t equipped to deal with it at all. I was terrified and screaming. I had to explain to every different staff member that I had been attacked. I was also not coping well with strangers touching me and I felt that the staff were blaming me for being oversensitive.”

She adds that it made her slow to bond with her daughter: “I still wonder how this affected her early emotional development. I feel angry that my rapist was allowed to do that to her and there was nothing to protect us from that. For the last year, I have been thinking that I would love another baby but I couldn’t have one because I didn’t want to risk this happening again. I am so over the moon that this clinic is happening. This allows me and my husband to have another child in safety.”

Inderjeet Kaur, a consultant midwife at the Royal London, added: “For women who have been sexually assaulted it is especially important that they feel in control and are offered seamless continuity of care. This will promote confidence and trust so they can be open with their midwife to ensure that their experience will not trigger painful memories, and help nurture a strong lasting bond between mother and baby.”

Face-to-face appointments will be offered from July 29. Woman from outside the hospital’s catchment area can ask to be referred. Ms Amara says that she hopes to set up more clinics all over the country.