Maternity services at a health trust at the centre of a baby deaths inquiry must improve say inspectors

Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt ordered an investigation into the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust in April. The Care Quality Commission (CQC) report said overall care had got better but safety in maternity services “needed further improvement”.

Inspectors visited the Trust’s Princess Royal Hospital, Royal Shrewsbury Hospital and its five midwife led maternity units, in December and January to check whether improvements had been made following its previous inspection in October 2014. They found progress had been made at the trust as a whole, but gave it a “requires improvement” rating for being safe, responsive and well-led.

The CQC’s chief inspector of hospitals, Prof Ted Baker, said end-of-life care services had made “significant progress” and “a positive change in culture among staff and leaders at the trust” was noted.

But he said action was needed particularly with regard to “maintaining appropriate staffing levels in the emergency department and ensuring a strong safety and learning culture within maternity services”. Seven babies died in a 20-month period between September 2014 and May 2016.

It appears that “safety incidents were not always being shared with all staff” to support improvements and there was a lack of regular post-natal ward rounds which meant “high risk” post-natal women were not regularly reviewed and on the Wrekin midwife led unit and “medicines management was also a concern”.

However, the report did praise “caring and compassionate staff” and rated providing effective services and caring services as “good”.

The trust had commissioned the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists to help and worked with the Virginia Mason Institute in the US to improve patient safety and the CQC said medical care at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital and the Princess Royal Hospital had made “significant improvement.” But it admitted failing to hit the government’s target of admitting or transferring 95% of A&E patients within four hours.

The Trust chief executive acknowledges the need for improvement and says that “is the driving force behind our plans to reconfigure hospital services and to work more closely with GPs”.

Amanda Cavanagh, a member of the the Clinical Negligence team at Ashtons Legal, comments: “It is tragic to think that the investigation into the deaths of these babies had to be ordered by Jeremy Hunt! Surely one unnecessary baby death is enough to alert a trust to investigate, review, improve and educate their staff? What are all the very well paid managers and chief executives doing in the Trusts if not looking after the essential welfare of its patients? ”.