Wednesday 6 November 2024
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Nottingham

Bereaved family given unclean hospital room with dirty toilet and unmade bed

The chair of the Nottingham maternity review says some problems with the services in the city are being repeated despite her raising them with senior managers.

Recurring issues include a lack of civility and compassion from some staff, racism and discrimination, as well as a lack of cleanliness in clinical areas.

The comments come from experienced midwife Donna Ockenden, who is currently running what is thought to be the largest review into maternity services in NHS history in Nottingham.

More than 1,900 families and around 750 staff members are now involved, while Nottinghamshire Police has also set up a separate criminal investigation into previous failings at services run by Nottingham University Hospitals (NUH).

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) visited both the Queen’s Medical Centre and City Hospital in June without informing the trust, and found insufficient staffing levels and skills, and raised hygiene concerns.

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In an update on July 11, Ms Ockenden said: “There has been an unannounced visit by the CQC in recent weeks and I think it is fair to say the findings mirror that which we are hearing from staff on the ground ourselves, and to some degree mirror that which we are hearing from women.

•  NUH Maternity services under scrutiny after unannounced CQC inspections

“I am finding that themes that I saw 18 months ago around staffing, around skill mix, around staff feeling burnt out and tired, I’m having to repeat.

“Staff are coming to us with concerns. A recent example is community maternity staffing and resource. I escalated that to the trust and six weeks later, staff came back and said what we’ve heard nothing.

“Concerns from families that are being repeated are, on some occasions, not always by any stretch to the imagination, but a lack of civility, a lack of kindness, or lack of compassion.

“Some members of staff are shouting at new mothers in front of other patients and themes around racism and discrimination are still being heard.

“I’ve met with many black families in the last couple of weeks an and in terms of this racism and discrimination, and poor care and women feeling othered [excluded], these are babies being born within the last few months.

“Another issue that I have been really concerned about and again, I understand the CQC picked this up, is the lack of cleanliness in some maternity clinical areas.

“I’ve raised this before. Recently I’ve met with parents, including one family who were going through a bereavement, and they were shown to a room that was clearly unclean, a bed that had clearly been slept in, and had dirty toilets and so on.

“It does concern me the things that I have discussed with the trust on a number of occasions, I’m having to re-discuss.”

Asked why she feels some issues are recurring, Ms Ockenden said she is absolutely of the belief chief executive Anthony May and his team are “deeply committed to maternity improvement”.

However she feels there is potentially a gap between the board, which Mr May sits on, and the maternity wards.

“Staff themselves are saying the senior leadership team, that cement between the two layers, are frequently invisible and that then could lead to a situation where progress is not as quick as it should be,” she said.

“At the minute, change is not happening fast enough but it doesn’t mean the change isn’t occurring.”

Anthony May, Chief Executive at NUH said: “I met with Donna earlier this week to talk through her concerns and how we are addressing them.

“We have been meeting with Donna regularly for some time now, and I am grateful for the feedback Donna is able to give us as a direct result of her engagement with women, families and staff.

“Clearly, whilst some of what Donna shares is difficult to hear, it is important for us to listen carefully and to respond quickly.

“I am confident we are improving in a number of areas.  The feedback we are getting from mothers using the services now is encouraging. This was reinforced recently by the CQC when they gave us high level messages from the latest inspections of maternity services.

“These messages are supported by the June 2024 Friends and Family test in maternity where 98 per cent of patients reported positive experiences.  We have brought in key new leadership roles in recent months and I am confident this will have a positive impact.

“We have taken a number of direct actions in relation to the comments made around staff mix and visibility and will continue to monitor progress closely.  I am confident that our maternity services are properly staffed and that we have effective monitoring systems in place.”

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