TeamSafe CS
Every two minutes, a woman dies during pregnancy, childbirth, or within the postnatal period. Most of these mother’s deaths are preventable with timely, and high-quality care. Currently, 92% of all maternal and neonatal deaths globally occur in low- and middle-income countries, where access to safe surgery and anaesthesia care continues to remain very limited.
A caesarean section is one of the most commonly performed surgical procedures worldwide. Effective teamwork and communication between healthcare professionals is critical to ensuring safe caesarean section care for mothers and their babies. At present 700 mothers are dying every day, and 1 million babies are dying every year in the first 24 hours of life.
TeamSafe CS is a multidisciplinary training programme designed to strengthen both the technical and non-technical skills of healthcare teams involved in providing caesarean section care, this includes before, during and after the mother’s baby is delivered.
Why was TeamSafe CS developed?
Healthcare professionals who form part of the caesarean section team, tend to receive training within their own disciplines, and have limited opportunities to train together with the other members of their caesarean section team who they work with regularly in their health facilities.
TeamSafe CS trains teams bringing together obstetric providers, midwives, anaesthesia professionals and operating room nurses to develop and improve:
- Teamwork and communication skills
- Situational awareness and clinical decision-making
- Team and individual discipline management of emergency and elective caesarean sections
- Team management of major obstetric complications, which are the main contributors to maternal and neonatal deaths e.g. postpartum haemorrhage, sepsis, pre-eclampsia and eclampsia
- Understanding of multidisciplinary roles and responsibilities within the caesarean section team
- “Best” patient safety practices
A key feature of the course is that it trains complete caesarean section teams who work together regularly in clinical practice, helping strengthen team dynamics and improve maternal and neonatal outcomes.
Course Format
TeamSafe CS uses a hybrid learning approach that combines:
Online Learning
Participants complete approximately 4-5 hours of self-directed online learning, which consists of 11 short videos each with 5 MCQ questions to complete at the end the video, before attending a 2.5 day face-to-face course. The online training aims to serve as a refresher of key clinical knowledge needed for the face-to-face course.
Face-to-Face Training
Participants then attend a 2.5-day face-to-face course featuring skills training, case-based discussions, simulation, faculty demonstrations, team building games and half a day of individual discipline training. Lectures are kept to a minimum. The training comprises of 32 participants divided into 4 groups of 8. Each group contains 2 caesarean section teams with each team consisting of an obstetric provider, midwife, operating room nurse and an anaesthetic professional from 2 different hospitals. Built on the principles of adult learning, the style and format of the training reflect the successful methods used in the WFSA and Association of Anaesthetists SAFE courses over the past 15 years.
Participants must complete both components to receive certification of completion.
Pilot Programme
The first TeamSafe CS pilot was delivered in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, in June 2026 through a collaboration between WFSA, Society of Anaesthesiologists of Tanzania (SATA), Association of Gynaecologists and Obstetricians of Tanzania (AGOTA), and Tanzanian Midwives Association (TAMA).
The pilot trained eight multidisciplinary caesarean section teams (32 participants) from eight regional referral hospitals across Tanzania. TeamSafe CS faculty included all members of the caesarean section team: obstetricians, midwives, anaesthetic professionals and operating room nurses from both Tanzania and international partner organisations.
Following the successful first pilot, the faculty are currently reviewing participant feedback and refining the course materials ahead of the second pilot.
Developed Through Partnership
TeamSafe CS has been developed and is delivered by a multidisciplinary team of obstetric providers, midwives, obstetricians, gynaecologists, operating room nurses and anaesthetic professionals to reflect real-world clinical practice and promote collaboration across the different caesarean section team disciplines. Each discipline that forms part of the caesarean section team have been equally represented within the development and delivery of the training.
The programme forms part of the ongoing partnership between WFSA and the Laerdal Foundation to improve maternal and newborn outcomes through education, training, and quality improvement initiatives. The pilot was delivered with support from the Tanzania Ministry of Health, AGOTA, SATA, TAMA and Laerdal Global Health.
Funding
TeamSafe CS is funded by the Laerdal Foundation.
