New campaign to allow partners to stay on maternity wards.

I think the thing is, BoG, that people feel more vulnerable at night. There are less staff around, as there aren't routine observations etc going on. It's dark and women want to (try) to sleep. It's bad enough trying to sleep on a ward in a bay without extra randoms around. It should just be the patients overnight (women and babies) not extra people.

It's not going to happen specifically at night, but we've been asked to comment on night visitors specifically.

Pearl clutching is pretty dismissive of some of the horrendous things described by Needs and others.

There was a news report yesterday about women in labour being turned away, and referred to other hospitals, because no delivery rooms were available. Space on wards is clearly a big issue here - not enough space, not enough staff.

As an aside, in 2001 when I was having my first baby, at the Royal in Guildford, we were shown around the maternity unit. The nurse showed us all these rooms, which had previously been delivery rooms/ postnatal wards. They had been taken over by admin, and were now offices.

I find the pearl clutching a bit odd

Men are on post natal wards for roughly 12 hours during the day. Medical examinations etc will be going on during that time.
They are in delivery suite 24/7 albeit in private rooms.

I don't understand why all thus mansplaining and advocating and ignoring of single parents is going to happen specifically at night.

Plenty, what if the single ward was full though when a single woman came?

They could have more wards? Some women only and some women +1

In the maternity hospital I attended theres posters on the back of every toilet door detailing what dv and da is, and how it often begins in pregnancy. I was asked often if I experienced any abuse, always behind closed doors to dh because I am a patient and entitled to patient privacy.
My friend once attended an appointment with a lot of bruising on her arm from getting it caught in an attic hatch and immediately a specialist midwife took her to a side room and asked about the bruising. This is in one of the busiest maternity hospitals in Ireland.

And visitors were always kicked out at 9pm by security, except those in NICU.

thecageisfull, I absolutely didn't mean in any way to imply that you didn't try hard enough to get rid of him. I meant that the staff let you down in one of the worst possible ways. You shouldn't have been in that position, and when you were, the staff should have been able to remove him immediately using their security staff or the police if necessary. You shouldn't have had to struggle to get attention from the people that were tasked with looking after you.

I was just wondering whether the hospital gave you a response or an apology - if they recognised that they failed you.

Oh my goodness, thecageisfull that is just horrific. Did you manage to complain afterwards at all? They should have called security to get him removed, or the bloody police if necessary

I didn't complain afterwards. I just wanted to forget it happened. I went for a home birth the next time but unfortunately ended up with a crash section and 10 days in hospital. It was a very different experience as the visiting hours were relatively short and strictly enforced.

At the time there was no-one to call security. He wasn't asked to leave. I didn't have my mobile with me to ring for help and I wasn't in a position to go far enough to the ward phone at the unattended nurses station. I did try.

I'm not surprised people want their partners there when all to often the alternative is being alone but the answer is to increase the number of HCPs, not fill the wards with a whole spectrum of untrained men looking after them and theirs. At best they will provide support to 1 person and only be mildly annoying to the other 5. More likely they will be vaguely useful to 1 person but also be absolutely shattered and a bit clueless and have a noisy whisper and keep bumping into things and not be able to work out where the toilets are so will take a 30 min shit in the patients one. At worst they will physically/verbally/sexually assault either the woman they are with or the other women.

Personally I would like to see visiting hours cut down, or a lounge provided for visiting during a certain time to allow women to rest in the bays if they want to. It's exhausting having a baby and the length of time you have to put up with visitors not conducive to getting adequate rest. My sis gave birth in a hospital which had 8am to midnight. She cried with exhaustion. Every other inpatient is allowed time to rest (except children's wards which are a special kind of hell but maternity wards are for adults)

My gut reaction is that post-natal wards definitely should be a calm, safe women's (spouse-free) spaces.

And then I read thecage and Needs posts...that's shocking.

Random them instead of the

SillyLass

That's why pretty much everybody on both threads are saying improve the services.

Why does anybody need to go down the road of making them worse.

When you start normalising things people start viewing them as a right. Like them men who think its their right to attend the birth even if the mother does not want it,or the men who think its their right to stay on a PN ward even when they are being asked to leave,or attend what in essence are the woman's private medical appointments.

Visitors on PN wards are a major contributing factor in the lack of rest obtained and hassle for staff.

That is indeed what it has become basil unfortunately when you respond "well if he's abusing me I'm hardly going to announce it in front of him and chances are one of the reasons he's sat here would be to stop me,don't you think" result in the midwife deciding you are difficult

Jesus I can't believe the crassness and idiocy of asking a woman in front of her partner, if he's abusing her.

Surely everyone involved knows that this is a surefire way of ensuring that that question is merely a tick-boxing exercise and they will never get a truthful answer from a woman who is in fact being abused?

How is this being allowed to continue? Why is no-one questioning the value of this?

The point is sillyLass is that it does make a difference, a significant amount of the women I referred to had a crisis plan that actively involved them using the PN ward as a way to safely leave and had spent the last few weeks of their pregnancy preparing for that.

25 years ago the vast majority of my referrals came from maternity services or via disclosure to them now its a tiny amount unfortunately the rise in husbands/partners being at all midwifery appointments the birth and open access visiting hours(or overnight visiting or not enforcing the no overnight visitors) has hugely decreased abused women's ability to self report abuse and obtain help.

We know that violence and abuse often starts with a pregnancy or other large commitment yet in our drive to involve fathers we are reducing the safety of mothers.

I've had 2 children in the last 2 years at both booking in appointments I was asked infront of their father if I was experancing abuse,how is asking me infront of him productive? It is now normal within maternity services to rarely or even never see the mother by herself

I was one of the women who sat on the campaign group that fought for these questions to be asked,I was involved in designing the policy behind them and pushing it and I'm ashamed that I did not foresee what would happen with it.

Post natal wards being closed for visitors at night is quite literally the last chance some women have before interventions can become almost punitive and its the best chance we have of cashing in on the "I have this tiny little person to protect before they have been exposed" thing that happens to many abused women. It's one of the reasons we try to make sure we have specialist midwives sitting on DV forums.and a reason why lots and lots of DV workers do other training like the breast feeding peer support.

If mothers need support over night on a hospital ward do it using HCP or support services not family members because they may be the reason why they need support

I can't speak about the NHS, but in the US state I live in, physicians and other medical professionals are required to have continuing education about domestic violence and about how medical professionals can intervene to help women who may be victims. An important aspect of this training has to do with domestic violence and pregnancy. Victims of violence will sometimes disclose to medical staff, especially in a supportive setting, and be able to get help as a result.

the nhs can't do much to reduce dv outside the hospital, but it can and should control the extent to which abusers have opportunities to abuse inside the hospital

sillylass i'm sorry you had such a horrifying and traumatic experience at the hands of people who should have been caring for you. you are right that that shouldn't happen

the dv argument isn't weak SillyLass

Nobody should be having to choose between themselves getting abused in hospital or their children at home.
Nobody should be suffering abuse from HCP's either.

Two heartbreaking posts there form Needs and THeCageIsFull

Wouldn't it be much better to campaign for a HCA for PN wards than allow overnight guests and have to spring for a guard anyway because you don't know is tonight the night you'll need him

I've spent way too much time on mat wards over my 5 difficult pg and births, about 13 weeks altogether. Would have loved dp to have been able to stay. He could have fended off some of the total arse holes I had to put up with, men and women.

needs andthecages posts sum up perfectly why men should not be staying on wards, along with others post of pastexperiance of rape/ sexual assult anfd how uncomfortable it would make them feel.

It really is awful having to put up with listening to someone else's abusive twat of a partner during visiting, never mind 24 hour a day. Not to mention the fact that these poor women should be protected from their own partners at such a vulnerable time. For some ofthem its the only calm safe time they will have