Maternity services in crisis

Women are currently being let down by some maternity units, according to the Government’s health watchdog, the Healthcare Commission, which found 21% of maternity units falling into the least well performing category.

The Royal College of Midwives, the midwife union, said the problem arises from persistent underfunding by Government and called for 5,000 new midwives to be employed. The good news is that Government has just accepted this proposal.

The Healthcare Commission points out, though, that least well performing does not mean dangerous: “If we have concerns that a trust is unsafe, we do not hesitate to use our powers of enforcement by, for example, carrying out investigations.”

Maternity care crisis

In January, an independent review by the Healthcare Commission found a huge variation in quality of care across England. Of the 148 trusts assessed, 21 per cent fell into the ‘least well-performing’ category.

Trusts in London fared worst, where antenatal and postnatal care was consistently poorer. Women didn’t receive as many checks as recommended and had inconsistent quality of care around the time of birth.

The review, which took into account a survey of 26,000 mothers, also found that 40 per cent of ultrasound scans failed to fully check for abnormalities in unborn babies.

This was followed in March by a survey carried out by the Conservative Party, which found that 40 per cent of the 103 trusts who responded had turned away women in labour because they were full.

Larger maternity units were especially problematic – units like the University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust, which reported closing 28 times in 2007. All of this flies in the face of the Government’s manifesto pledge that by 2009 women would have choice over where and how they had their baby.

Worried about your partner?

It’s hard to imagine how distressing it would be for a woman in labour who rushed to hospital, only to be turned away and sent to another maternity unit. The National Childbirth Trust said women could be left ‘emotionally traumatised’ by the experience.

And this anxiety will also spread to their partners, who will be desperate for the birth of their child to go as smoothly as possible.

Tony Adebowale, whose wife Katie is expecting their first child in August, is extremely concerned:

‘We saw a documentary about the shocking state of one maternity ward in north London, so we decided not to go there – if we had the money we’d definitely go private. I think the Government needs to sort this out,’ he says. ‘The problem is not going to go away – women are always going to have babies.’

Whose fault is it?

Health Secretary Alan Johnson has responded with a pledge of an extra £122m annually for maternity services over the next three years.

But the Royal College of Midwives says the crisis is due to persistent under-funding – including a £55m cut in last year’s budget – so the Government is simply ‘playing catch-up’ with the new investment. The RCM also estimates that 5,000 extra midwives are needed to cope with rising birth rates.

Whatever steps are taken to resolve this crisis, for the pregnant women and their partners currently being let down by the NHS, it will be too little, too late.

What can you do about it?

The easiest thing that you can do is to write to or email your MP to express your concern about this state of affairs. The more pressure we put on our MPs, the more pressure they will put on the government to sort it out.

Author

Dan Roberts is a feature-writer and columnist with over ten years’ experience of working for The Guardian, The Observer, The Independent, Daily Express and Mail on Sunday, as well as numerous national magazines. His areas of expertise include health, wellbeing, relationships, psychology and parenting. Dan also writes two monthly columns, including Diary of a Single Dad, a humorous but affectionate account of raising his ten-year-old son, Ben. The best of Dan’s work can be found on his website at www.dan-roberts.net

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