KATE WILLS: I'm pregnant and fearful. Every woman I know has a horror story about giving birth on the NHS
When I found out I was pregnant in January, after two miscarriages and a round of IVF, I was overwhelmed with delight . . . quickly followed by a state of anxiety, which has only increased with the size of my bump.
Why? Because in three months' time I'll be having my baby at Homerton Hospital in east London, where in a recent online petition, the postnatal ward is described as 'an uncomfortable and distressing environment for new mothers'.
Yesterday the Health Secretary, Wes Streeting, launched a 'rapid national investigation' into 'systemic' failures in NHS maternity services in England, saying 'maternity units are failing, hospitals are failing, trusts are failing, regulators are failing'.
But do we really need yet another inquiry? No, what women require now is action.
The bad treatment women have experienced at my local hospital is sadly not an anomaly. In 2022, the Ockenden review found that urgent and sweeping changes are needed in all English hospitals to prevent avoidable baby deaths, stillbirths and neonatal brain damage.
The damning report had been looking into one of the biggest scandals in the history of the NHS, where grim failures at Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trusts between 2000 and 2019 led to 1,862 serious incidents including hundreds of baby deaths and an unusually high number of maternal deaths.
Yet it seems very little has changed. In February, Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust was fined £1.6 million after admitting it failed to provide safe care and treatment to three babies who died within months of one another.
But it's not just the odd hospital. Last year a Care Quality Commission (CQC) report, based on inspections of 131 maternity units, found that cases of women receiving poor care and being harmed in childbirth are in danger of becoming 'normalised'.
Every woman I know has a traumatic horror story about giving birth in an NHS hospital. One friend had such a distressing labour – 40 hours, very little food, left in a pool of her own blood – she's decided she can't go through it again, even though she wanted a second child.
Preparing to give birth should be a time of excitement and joy, not fear.
When I had my daughter Blake in 2020, I – thankfully – had a relatively straightforward birth, though it was still the most physically traumatic event of my life. At one stage, I was covered in blood and vomit, lying in a brightly lit room filled with medics, as one of them pulled me apart with brute force.
I still have flashbacks and I'm not surprised that roughly nine per cent of women experience postpartum PTSD.
This time around, the cracks at my hospital have shown from the outset. My first 'booking in' appointment with a midwife was so bad, I made a complaint. I was given incorrect advice about the medications I was taking for my IVF. I was assured I'd never see him again, but ended up back in front of him last week.
I've often waited more than an hour for my appointments. Some of the staff have been great, but they seem stressed and overworked to the point of exhaustion.
Midwifery used to be a respected profession and women would often see just one midwife for the duration of their pregnancy and birth.
Now a midwife's salary starts at £28,407, and they're leaving in droves. The Royal College of Midwives says there's an estimated shortfall of 2,500 full-time equivalent midwives in England alone.
And I need all the help an expert midwife can give me. I'm 40 and it's an IVF pregnancy. I've been advised to have an induction but the thought has left me terrified – it can lead to more medical interventions and a longer stay in a maternity ward friends have described as 'being like one in the developing world'.
I've looked at choosing another London hospital to give birth in, one which doesn't have such terrible reviews, but as my labour with my daughter was relatively short, I worry I wouldn't get there in time. So I'm trapped in an NHS system that I know may well put my – and my baby's – lives at risk.
Wes Streeting commissioning yet another limp investigation feels like a waste of time. We know from the Ockenden review what would improve services: more midwives with better training, better pay for maternity staff, more support.
Why not use the money being spent on this inquiry to fund maternity units?
The Health Minister might say this investigation will be 'rapid', but it won't be rapid enough for me, or the millions of other women due to give birth this year in failing maternity units nationwide. All we can do is hope and pray for the best.
These days it feels like the real miracle of childbirth is not just your bundle of joy, but getting through the experience unscathed.
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