Upcoming Trainings

Accompanying Parents When a Baby Dies: Caring for the Family while Caring for Yourself

Carol McMurrich, EdM, leads participants in an exploration of successful, compassionate bereavement care.

COST/ACCREDITATION: $45; 2.5 contact hours through ANAMass (This nursing continuing professional development activity was approved by American Nurses Association Massachusetts, an accredited approver by the American Nurses Credentialing Center’s Commission on Accreditation)

DESCRIPTION: This abbreviated session is an essential annual course for those who care for parents at the bedside when a baby dies. Perfect for nurses, doulas, doctors and midwives who are there when a family learns of a baby's death, and who must then coach them through the process of delivery, time together, and saying goodbye. 

McMurrich’s professional trainings are designed with nurses and OBGYNs on the front lines and are based on her extensive training with the Perinatal Loss and Infant Death Alliance, Share, Pregnancy and Infant Loss, Inc, her own research, and her thirteen years of work with hundreds of bereaved families across Western Massachusetts and beyond.

REGISTER: https://givebutter.com/may6training

HYBRID Pregnancy and Infant Loss Training for Clinicians

Carol McMurrich, EdM, leads participants in an exploration of successful, compassionate bereavement care.

COST/ACCREDITATION: $40; Credits for social workers pending through NASWMA (Application for social work continuing education credits has been submitted. Please contact us at 413-544-5922 for the status of social work CE accreditation)

DESCRIPTION: This session is a candid exposure to the realities of what pregnancy and infant loss can be like for parents, what the normal trajectory of grief and healing looks like, and the language and strategies that help and hurt. This session will feature a parent panel.

McMurrich’s professional trainings are designed with nurses and OBGYNs on the front lines and are based on her extensive training with the Perinatal Loss and Infant Death Alliance, Share, Pregnancy and Infant Loss, Inc, her own research, and her thirteen years of work with hundreds of bereaved families across Western Massachusetts and beyond.

REGISTER: https://givebutter.com/may9training

HYBRID Accompanying Parents When a Baby Dies: Caring for the Family while Caring for Yourself

Carol McMurrich, EdM, leads participants in an exploration of successful, compassionate bereavement care.

COST/ACCREDITATION: $55; 3.5 contact hours through ANAMass (This nursing continuing professional development activity was approved by American Nurses Association Massachusetts, an accredited approver by the American Nurses Credentialing Center’s Commission on Accreditation)

DESCRIPTION: This session is an essential annual course for those who care for parents at the bedside when a baby dies. Perfect for nurses, doulas, doctors and midwives who are there when a family learns of a baby's death, and who must then coach them through the process of delivery, time together, and saying goodbye. This longer course includes a parent panel.

McMurrich’s professional trainings are designed with nurses and OBGYNs on the front lines and are based on her extensive training with the Perinatal Loss and Infant Death Alliance, Share, Pregnancy and Infant Loss, Inc, her own research, and her thirteen years of work with hundreds of bereaved families across Western Massachusetts and beyond.

REGISTER: https://givebutter.com/may21training

 Empty Arms is accredited by ANA Massachusetts and NASWMa **

This means we come with our own contact hours, and you don’t have to do any paperwork to offer your staff continuing education credit.

 While many of us would rather not think about babies dying, the truth is that sometimes they do die. When they do, it is our moral obligation as care providers to usher families through that loss experience. Research is conclusive that when we do this well, our attitudes and communication skills positively impact parents’ decision making, resilience, and long term well being. On the flip side, when we are unsure in our care and lack skills and confidence, research finds that down the road, patients’ grief is exacerbated and their healing is hindered. With so many new nurses in the field, there is an unprecedented need for training and support around perinatal bereavement care, both for the wellbeing of our patients, but also for the wellbeing of our staff. 

Empty Arms has served nearly a thousand individuals over the past 14 years, and speaker Carol McMurrich carries all those stories with her. Every story involves the intersection of health care with the loss experience. How parents perceive the care they receive from doctors, nurses, midwives, and social workers profoundly affects the way in which they experience the trauma of their loss as it takes place, as well as affecting their ability to make good decisions, build resilience, and thrive after discharge.

 Empty Arms offers tailored, accredited professional development opportunities that seek to increase your staff’s skills, language, and general fluency and comfort around perinatal bereavement care. With the ability to choose when, where, and how your program is presented, Empty Arms offers the ultimate flexibility so that you can gift your staff with the tools they need to thrive while offering bereavement care to families in your facility.  

What we offer can best be summed up in the words of Nursing Practice Specialist Beth West of Massachusetts General Hospital, who worked with us this fall to plan a January 2022 training with their Labor and Delivery Staff: 

As a bereaved parent and experienced facilitator of Empty Arms, Carol weaves her own experience and that of many others she has worked with (with permission) to create an intimate, personal presentation with adequate time for participants to share their stories, emotions, and concerns. Knowing the impact that educating providers can have on the experience of families experiencing loss, professional trainings are one of Carol’s favorite things to do.

**Approved by American Nurses Association of Massachusetts, an accredited approver by the American Nurses Credentialing Center's Commission on Accreditation.  Nurses who attend and participate in the entire course will be awarded 6 contact hours.

**Social Work Continuing Education hours pending, expected April 2024

Ensuring that caregivers are well trained in knowing how to compassionately interact with the bereaved is one of our primary goals. Empty Arms hosts large educational events, and also offers smaller professional trainings tailored to a group of providers who wish to increase their own knowledge of how to compassionately care for the bereaved.

Carol McMurrich, our director, has an undergraduate degree in sociology and psychology, a Masters in Education, and over a dozen years of working first hand with bereaved families in both the hospital and support group setting. She has provided presentations on grief and loss, ranging from one to six hours, to hospital units, university nursing courses, midwifery practices, doula groups, and hospital groups. Whether you are looking to provide a larger training to a diverse group or are simply looking for somebody to provide an in-service training to your staff, Carol will work with you to develop a program which will best suit your needs. Please email carol@emptyarmsbereavement.org with inquiries.

Visit our Testimonials page to hear what professionals thought of their Empty Arms training.