COUNCILLORS have questioned how maternity services will meet future demand after NHS bosses approved the permanent closure of two birthing units.
The freestanding midwife-led units at Samuel Johnson Community Hospital in Lichfield and at Stafford’s County Hospital were temporarily suspended during the Covid pandemic.
However, last month saw NHS Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent and NHS Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin Integrated Care Board [ICB] Boards in Common approve a recommendation to make the closures permanent.
A report on the proposals was presented to members of Staffordshire County Council’s health and care overview and scrutiny committee.
It said a 12-week public consultation took place between May and August last year and received more than 1,400 survey responses plus feedback from face-to-face and online events.
A further targeted engagement also ran in February this year, to understand any potential impact of the changes to glucose tolerance testing and Anti-D immunoglobulin at Samuel Johnson Community Hospital.
The report said:
"The consultation survey asked for people’s views on the proposals for birthing services at County Hospital and Samuel Johnson Community Hospital.
"For both sites, most respondents felt this would have a negative impact on people."
Cath Marsland, associate director of nursing and quality and priority populations for the ICB, told the committee travel was one of the most raised concerns during the consultation process. Patient choice and the impact on other hospitals were also highlighted.
A board meeting was told last month that the travel impact would be "minimal" and that both Royal Stoke and Queen’s Hospital in Burton had sufficient capacity for low-level midwife-led births.
Cllr Colin Greatorex said at the county council meeting:
"There’s very little in the report about the nature of responses. I recognise the need for the second consultation because the first one was overwhelmingly negative about the aspect of the closures.
"These reports do not reflect that – nor the views that we’ve given – that suggest that the closures should have been challenged.
"I can’t see anything that suggests those concerns that had been expressed by those 1,400 people have been documented, commented on, refuted if necessary or given any credence or credibility.
"The decision is the decision – the ICB will decide what it wants to do in the way of maternity provision. But I do question the whole aspect of the consultation, and what exactly does need to happen to make a consultation have some effect.
"Samuel Johnson Community Hospital's unit, when it was available, was a lot more personable, a lot more homely and a lot more comforting to the parents involved, as opposed to Burton which is a bigger, less personable, almost automatic process.
"You can’t replicate that when it’s bigger. The relationship with the midwives is a lot closer."
The ICB recognised that travel was an impact, the committee was told. But the majority of appointments would still be delivered within the community, particularly for antenatal and postnatal services, and home births were still being offered.
The report said people were asked during both stages for any additional ideas or suggestions the ICB should consider. No new proposals were identified that had not already been considered throughout the process.
Committee chair Cllr Antonia Orlandi-Fantini said:
"With the increase in population, if there is a home birth and it becomes a possible risk and they have to be taken into hospital, are the hospitals and units going to be able to support the increase of women being taken in?
"Is this going to create a clinical risk and are these hospitals going to be able to viably take in the higher volume of women and be able to treat them without any risk happening?"
Ms Marsland said:
"Those women that are giving birth at home are deemed to be very low risk.
"Throughout their pregnancy, while there may have been a decision that they were low risk, that can change very quickly and the hospital will know that and will plan for that.
"In an emergency situation where a home birth is going significantly wrong and they would need to be taken in, that happens infrequently, so wouldn’t impact per se on numbers on the unit at the time."
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