201 babies and 9 women died, 94 babies with life changing injuries, all avoidable

[quote BattenbergdowntheHatches]@LethargeMarg it’s also the inevitable result of HR policies that mean there will never be an consequences for NHS employees, no matter how vile you are to patients.[/quote]
Not true nurses and midwives are registered with the Nmc and are regularly called to account and lose their registration if they don't keep to the standards of the code- you can look up online to see action taken .

I’ve always felt that my DS was lucky to be born alive and without life changing injuries due to the neglectful and cruel care that we received in labour ( different hospital).
I’m sobbing at the memory of the harsh way I was treated, and DS is 32.

Yes, who knows about other hospitals and the parents who thought 'it was just bad luck'
It's never too late to speak up

Compassion fatigue does not hold any water with me, i’ve been in a caring role for over 23 years wow whilst I don’t have people‘s lives in my hands so my stress levels are not gonna be compatible with medical staff I can still choose to do my job or I can choose to do my job with sensitivity and kindness and that’s what I do every single day.

Yes, I also think the system has a lot to answer for when it comes to staff burnout and staff neglect of patients. Must be difficult to engage in quality patient centred care if you are on double shifts with a massive caseload, paperwork, inadequate support and supervision ect.

Many people said "this is going to hurt" was misogynist, but I don't think the show was condoning the neglectful behaviour of the doctor. More putting it in the context of a brutal system.

When it comes to nurses and even junior doctors they are at the bottom rung of a very hierarchal and rigid structure I hear.

But again, this isn't to excuse, just to put in context.

Yes good point Lethe, in my case I know that the midwife was looking after other people at the same time and argued not yo take another because I heard it all. She was then made to take me and took it out on me!!

@LethargeMarg
That is a very good point.

@AnotherNC22

My DD had GBS sepsis at birth last year, which affected so many of the babies in this report. She survived with (so far) no long term complications identified due to the brilliant team at our hospital who picked it up early and got her into the NICU in good time. I'm so so angry that others in the UK haven't been able to access the same level of care and i just feel so much for all the women affected in the report. The two mothers who pushed for this are absolutely amazing.

By the time I had my 6 year old the NHS hospital was doing testing (this wasn’t standard at the time, don’t know if it is now) and I was positive again.

I read the BBC article and it’s heartbreaking how this toxic environment went on for over twenty years...the oldest couple in the BBC article had lost their baby in 2000.

My list is similar to a PP as to the causes of this:

1. NHS staff and budget cuts
2. The fact the nursing bursary was stopped for years causing a shortage of midwives specifically
3. The training of midwives has gone down from 3yrs to 1yr and with far less clinical training actually assisting at births. This has led to dangerous levels of incompetence in many midwives and maternity wards.
4. The pushing of natural birth as best without the competence to recognise its worst for complex higher risk pregnancies
5. The misogyny inherent in how labouring women are treated like cattle and dehumanised by the whole process in the maternity ward.

It is, but there is a lot that's specifically female and maternity related about this. And bear in mind the investigation covers a period beginning in 2000. Not to say the NHS was perfect then, it certainly wasn't, but the funding and staffing situation then was very different to what it is now. This is about ideology as well as resources.

I agree and it is the best example of women being failed and not listened to. I nearly died in childbirth due to a hospital acquired infection - the key to the story being not being listened to.
I still think that women's health is underfunded and has been all my life. But yes today the situation is much worse than it would have been in say 2000. As someone coming into menopause the current availibility crisis is just another kick in the teeth.

I agree with Hardy. This goes back a long way and the NHS can't play the underfunded card. While I'm sure the actual lines in a budget for lots of senior NHS manager salaries are small compared to the overall budget, the fact many of them were and are paid way, way above almost all (if not all) other parts of the public sector shows how cut off they are from oversight. And the oversight mechanisms failed abysmally too.

Being that cut off from the outside, from the real world, seems to have helped these organisations ignore women and - as is reported - blame them.

You don't need to be funded well, in order to treat women like human beings.

My heart absolutely breaks for these families. I was absolutely rocked to my core reading some of the detail of the report yesterday. Let's hope this signals a real moment of change for this CCG and the NHS more widely.
I've been lucky enough to receive excellent care in the different hospitals I had my children in - of course this should be standard and consistent across the NHS, like others have previously said.

It is horrendous beyond words. Those poor women and their babies 💐 Something has to change. Poor care is excused time and time again.

Can only agree the women who instigated this investigation are heroes. My heart goes out to everyone affected.

This is heartbreaking but not shocking at all. I expect my local trust is much higher rated but it too failed many women and there have been countless avoidable deaths of mothers as well as babies.

We should also remember that its not just maternity services. Most of the NHS is now in a state where avoidable deaths are the norm and poor care is the best that can be achieved due to funding and lack of staff.

Absolutely heartbreaking and horrific to read. Also very triggering. Women are treated appallingly by the NHS. And it's not just male Dr's and nurses, I've had the most awful comments and treatment from midwives in all of my births. There is a culture of bullying, intimidation, trivialising and negligence in maternity services. The problem is most women are just so shell shocked and glad to have made it out alive that they don't go back to revisit the trauma or complain. My heart is broken for the families affected, and I keep thinking we could have been one of them.

Maternity care is so consistently poor in my area that if you come across a midwife who is genuinely caring and OK (not good, just ok) at her job then you feel extremely grateful and lucky. I had 2 near misses and the cruelty of the midwives and Dr's is something I'll always carry with me.

Absolutely devastating. The families' experiences are heartbreaking.

I too am unsurprised after my experiences.

Ultimately, the ideology at the root of what happened in Shropshire couldn't have come to exist without a toxic brew of biological essentialism and sins of Eve attitude. And the neglect happened because it was women's bodies, too.

Heartbreaking, shocking and yet at the same time, entirely unsurprising, because we all know women who have suffered horrendous treatment during pregnancy and birth.

What happens now? It is screamingly clear that this is not just a problem in one trust. The attitudes that lead to these deaths and injuries are endemic within the professions, nationally, it would seem. What have the Royal Colleges said? The universities training the next generation?

Rhiannon and Kayleigh have done their bits now, they can rest and finally have space to grieve their daughters. The professionals now need to pick up the baton and effect the changes needed, not just in Shrewsbury but for every mother across the country. And they need to be seen to be doing so as well. We need to keep our eyes on them.

Horrible experience here too, luckily no ill effects on the baby but for years I felt that he had been born under a curse as the midwife was so horrible to me. Memorably she said 'I'm not in the mood for chatting' when I asked her a question. I did complain and was totally gaslight about how I must have misinterpreted words of encouragement!!

I'm in another country. I'm constantly startled at how frequently forceps are used in UK delivery, based on the stories I hear. I commented on this on MN, and had a couple of very patronizing nurses telling me that forceps are only used when there is no alternative. How come they are used so much more rarely in every other developed country, then? There is definitely an ideological element with it. Plus, I suppose yanking babies out is cheaper than doing surgery.