Hungry mothers in dirty wards, according to ongoing maternity study

Hungry mothers, dirty wards and poor care are blighting England’s maternity services, while staff receive death threats for working in some units, according to a new report.

Baroness Amos, who is chairing a review of maternity care, said what she has seen so far “has been much worse” than she had anticipated.

Some women felt guilty for their baby’s death, while others suffered a lack of empathy, care or apologies when things went wrong, and poor and black mothers often ended up with discriminatory services.

Health Secretary Wes Streeting, who organized the review, said: “The systemic failings that cause preventable tragedies cannot be ignored.”

Streeting said Baroness Amos’ update “demonstrates that too many families have been let down, with devastating consequences”.

“I know that NHS staff are dedicated professionals who want the best for mothers and babies, and that the vast majority of births are safe, but the systemic failures that cause preventable tragedies cannot be ignored,” she said.

The National Maternity and Newborn Inquiry aims to produce a set of national recommendations to improve maternity and newborn services after previous research had exposed problems but did not lead to sufficient sustained improvements.

Baroness Amos’s report – her initial reflections and impressions three months into the inquiry – highlights just how entrenched poor care is.

Speaking to the BBC, the former UN diplomat said she recognized there was “skepticism” and “criticism” of her approach.

“Time and time again, families feel that the system has failed them. I am very keen that that does not happen this time. And I think the fact that the Secretary of State has taken such an interest is what will make a big difference.”

According to Amos’ review, various investigations carried out over the past decade, including investigations into maternity services in Morecambe Bay, Shrewsbury & Telford and East Kent, have led to 748 recommendations for improvements.

However, the damage continues: the largest maternity inquiry in the history of the NHS, examining around 2,500 cases in Nottingham, is due to be presented in June, while another inquiry into care at Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust was recently announced.

After visiting seven NHS trusts and meeting more than 170 families, Baroness Amos said she had consistently encountered:

• Lack of cleanliness, women not receiving food or help going to the bathroom, and catheters not being emptied.
• Women are not being heard, including concerns about reduced fetal movements.
• women of color, working-class women, and people with mental health issues receiving discriminatory care
• NHS organizations “check their own homework” when babies die or are harmed, without addressing bad behaviour, including inappropriate language.

The examination also involved collaboration with maternity services staff. Some reported having rotten fruit thrown at them, while others said they faced death threats after negative publicity or were attacked on social media.

Adverse media attention could hinder the delivery of high-quality care, they said, although it had also acted as a catalyst for improvements.

Baroness Amos’s final report is due to be published in the spring, but her research is controversial. Some families believe that the limitations on what can be done and the limited time available to do it will mean that no meaningful action can be taken.

The Maternity Safety Alliance, which wants to see a statutory public inquiry into maternity failings, said initial reflections had “prioritised” staff feelings and minimized the “avoidable harm that occurs in NHS maternity services every day”.

“This is completely the wrong process to address deep-seated and long-standing failings in maternity care and we don’t understand why [Wes Streeting] “is allowing this farce to continue.”

Streeting will chair a new National Maternity and Neonatology Task Force in the New Year which will be responsible for implementing Baroness Amos’ recommendations. He promised that families who have suffered poor care “will remain at the center” of what follows the review.

James Titcombe, a veteran campaigner for maternity safety since losing his son Joshua in 2008, said that while the issues identified by Baroness Amos “reflect long-standing issues that we have known about for years”, he supported her work as representing “the best opportunity in a generation to finally put maternity services on a safer path”.