UK: Meltdown on our maternity wards

With Britain’s midwife shortage now becoming critical, a ‘Sunday Telegraph’ investigation reveals the depths of desperation felt by hospital staff at their inability to offer even basic care to expectant mothers.
By Laura Donnelly
 16 Jan 2011

Excerpt:
Twenty midwives working in NHS hospitals across the country agreed to be interviewed by this newspaper. All spoke out on condition that their real names were not used, because they believe that the service which employs them is failing to meet the most basic requirements of expectant mothers.

For eight years, Anna MacDonald has worked at one of the largest maternity units in the country. During this period, the number of births in England and Wales has risen by 17 per cent. Mrs MacDonald says pressures are such that her unit is now "on a knife edge", often unable to meet even basic standards of safety.

The maternity service is regularly filled to capacity; three or four times a week it closes, refusing all admissions, sending women in labour around the country to other units as far as 60 miles away.

Shortages of anaesthetists and midwives mean women are left to beg for epidural pain relief in vain, says the experienced midwife. Despite national standards to check foetal heart rates every 15 minutes, when pressures mount, a gamble is taken, and checks are delayed.

Mrs MacDonald, 36, says: "Often we will leave a woman on her own for far longer than we want to. When you go back, sometimes you find yourself just praying there is still a foetal heartbeat. We are leaving terrified women alone and in pain." the rest