Co-founder, The BEAR Program, Lamaze; Australia

Leslie Arnott has over 19 years’ experience as a consumer advisor and advocate in maternity services. As co-founder of Lamaze Australia she heads up The BEAR (Birth Equity Advocacy Research) Program that provides consumer advocacy and develops consumer-led projects to establish partnerships with service providers to improve health outcomes for Australian birthing families. She holds positions on various committees such as the Women’s Healthcare Australia’s (WHA) Breakthrough Collaborative, the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Healthcare (ACSQHC) Standard for Perineal Trauma, the Lamaze International Research Committee and the Women’s Health Research Translation & Impact Network. Leslie is a Lamaze Certified Childbirth Educator and has a Master’s Degree in Maternal-Child Health Systems. Her thesis was instrumental in developing WHA’s Consumer Engagement Plan.

Leslie specialises as a stakeholder liaison with a focus on health equity. She represents a wide range of experiences from connections with users and providers of maternity services.