Share review of Bassetlaw District General Hospital

Bassetlaw District General Hospital 2017-11-30 Person 2 5 0

I now wish to take the time to voice my concerns over the care I received over the course of my pregnancy. Fortunately as a mother of now four children my last pregnancy was not an unknown in relation to the care, appointments and antenatal procedures I would face, however unlike the care I received in my previous three pregnancies (all be it in a different county) I did not receive half the level of care under Bassetlaw. No.1 The appointments I had with my community midwives seem to be almost nonexistent with me getting well into late pregnancy before it seemed they even knew who I was, along with this was infrequent blood tests, baby heartbeat checks and general baby growth checks. I understand that being my fourth I was of "less risk" etc but I don't believe my level of care should have been any less then that of a first time parent. N0.2 There seems to be a culture that has developed within the community midwives and other related community health professionals that refer every pregnant person to the consultants at the hospital in an almost passing the buck kind of way. Baby "maybe" big = hospital, baby not moved for ten minutes = hospital, trying to arranged home birth = hospital, anything else related to pregnancy = hospital. It seems like midwives want to distance themselves from their job role and show no interested in doing their job, making judgements, decisions or preforming basic checks. This culture has left hospital consultants overwhelmed and pregnant women frustrated. No.3 I did plan a home birth for my pregnancy which in the end I did not get due to lack of midwives. This was really frustrating as the effort I made to make it possible seeing consultants multiple times and being fobbed off intentionally giving me delayed decisions with no justifiable reason etc. I gave up at one point they had won I was beaten into submission and left feeling total alone and hopeless. I was given a glimmer of hope and i pushed on once more to get the go ahead the midwives wanted but then like I say when the day came it was to no joy as a phone call from the midwife on call that night saying she didn't have another midwife to assist her meant I had to go to hospital. All the effort i had put in over the previous months was instantly washed away by the one thing I could not control. No.4 Contact numbers on the bounty pack for both the hospital and labour ward where incorrect when it came to phone with it going straight though to an unknown number dial tone, so while in labour I'm having to search the internet to find a number I could call to get hold of the labour ward. I want to finish off by saying I feel sorry for any new parents as they will not know any different and will just except the poor level of care as just normal, but it's far from adequate with what I say a massive failings that will inevitably put lives at risk both born and unborn.