The Oklahoma House approved legislation giving parents of stillborn children the opportunity to direct where their child’s remains are placed.

Senate Bill 284, by Sen. Stephanie Bice, R-Oklahoma City, and Rep. Sean Roberts, R-Hominy, also requires medical facilities maintain a written policy for the disposition of the remains of a child from stillbirth or fetal death event at the hospital. It passed the House 83-6.

Roberts said he served as the House author because he and his wife lost a child to stillbirth five years ago nearly to the day of SB 284’s passage in the House. 

“Having lost a child myself, I’ve undergone firsthand the overwhelming pain that parents go through during the days following the death of their baby,” Roberts said. “It’s confusing, frightening and tragic. We need to be doing anything that we can as a state and as individuals to help these parents navigate these impossible decisions they hoped to never have to make.”