£2.45 million pledged to improve childbirth care

Nadine Dorries has announced £2.45 million of funding which will benefit NHS maternity staff and improve the safety of the women and babies they care for.

The maternity safety minister said that, in collaboration with the Royal College of Midwives and The Healthcare Improvement Studies Institute at the University of Cambridge, £2 million will be used by Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists to test the best ways to spot early warning signs of babies in distress.

This will lead to the first phase of the Avoiding Brain injuries in Childbirth (ABC) Collaboration, which aims to develop a nationally agreed approach for how staff monitor the condition of a baby during labour. This is done by testing different approaches to monitoring babies during labour and surveying maternity staff to see how midwives and obstetricians currently identify when a baby is in distress during labour and how they then deliver babies even more safely. It will also see women and their birth partners interviewed on these varying approaches based on their personal experiences.

As well as testing out best practices for monitoring and responding to a baby’s well-being during labour, the funding will also focus on managing complications with a baby’s positioning during caesarean section to reduce brain injuries.

The Department of Health and Social Care has also provided almost £450,000 to the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists to develop a new workforce planning tool to improve how maternity units calculate their medical staffing requirements, to better support families and babies.

The college will collaborate with and gather data from the health sector, determining how the tool can help NHS Trusts to understand their own medical staffing needs, and provide standardised, safe and personalised care tailored to their communities.

Dorries said: “I am determined to make sure as many mums as possible can go home with healthy and happy babies in their arms. This new programme, which we’re supporting with over £2.45 million, aims to spot warning signs earlier and save lives, preventing families and their babies from facing the horrific ordeal of a life-changing brain injury. It will help us deliver on our ambition to halve brain injuries during birth by 2025. Having the right maternity staff in the right place at the right time means they can learn from one another, give the best care for mums and babies and build a safe and positive environment for both staff and pregnant women in maternity teams across the country.”