According to a recent survey Torbay and South Devon NHS Foundation Trust’s maternity services are continuing to perform well in comparison to other NHS Trust’s across the country.
The survey revealed that the trusts maternity services has responded especially well to the wishes of new mothers for extra post-natal support, with partners or a support worker now enabled to stay with them 24 hours a day.
The survey, Maternity Services Survey, is commissioned by the independent health and social care watchdog the CQC (Care Quality Commission).
Results of the survey provides the NHS Trusts with feedback about how well the maternity services are performing and whether key performance targets are being met.
Along side this it also gives a vital insight into the experience of new mothers.
Across the UK, over 126 NHS Trust’s were involved in the survey, with responses coming directly from thousands of women who gave birth during February 2018.
Very Positive Feedback
In total Torbay & South Devon NHS Trust was rated by 124 women who have given birth either at home, in the Newton Abbot Community Hospital (Whitelake Midwifery Led Unit) or at Torbay Hospital.
New mums gave exceptionally positive feedback about their experiences and as a result it has meant that the Trust has scored better than other Trusts in 11 of the 53 questions and scored similar to other organisations in 37 areas including:
- being provided with choice about where to have their baby
- being given the help needed when contacting the midwifery team
- taking into consideration women’s personal circumstances when giving advice being involved in the decisions made regarding care
- being listened to
- being treated with kindness and understanding
- cleanliness of the hopsital room/ward
- information, active support and encouragement about feeding their baby
- receiving help and advice in the post-natal period
- Consideration and support for emotional health
- Having skin to skin contact with their baby immediately after birth
- being able to access feeding advice during evenings, nights and even weekends
Head of Midwifery and Gynaecology at Torbay & South Devon NHS Foundation Trust said:
“Our team supports the birth 2,300 of babies each year and we aim to give each and every mother and baby the best start to motherhood and life.
“We really value this open and honest feedback as it enables us to see what’s working well and what we could do even more of to support mothers throughout their pregnancy, birth and beyond. We are sincerely thankful to the women who took the time to complete the survey, with over 41 per cent of women responding to the survey, significantly higher than the national response rate of 36 per cent.
“In our survey last year some mothers felt improvements could be made around postnatal care within the hospital. As a result, we reviewed our care provision.
“Following a successful trial, of enabling partners or a supporter to stay 24 hours a day, we fully implemented this with good feedback from women regarding the additional support this offered to them. This was reflected with an increased satisfaction rate within the survey. We also introduced the use of iPads with postnatal information that could be watched and then discussed with the maternity staff prior to going home.
“Going forward we will now look at the result of this survey to look at other ways in which we can further enhance the experience of our mothers and babies.”
