Midwife Concerns (Need Advice)

[RainBeauMandMs]

I would like to begin by saying that I am writing this on behalf of a friend. She has asked to not too much detail about what happened.

Almost 4 years ago my friend lost her baby while giving birth.
From the first signs that something was wrong, and the midwife making the decision and moving her to the surgical ward was nearly 30 minutes, sadly by the time my friend reached a theatre it was already too late.

The hospital carried out an investigation and the midwife was cleared of any wrongdoing.

The reason I am writing this post is because I have recently found out that the midwife in question left out (in my opinion) a very Important piece of information. A few hours before the midwife's shift started she found out that a close family member had died, she never told anyone at the hospital, didn't inform her manager or anything, plus it turns out that she regularly phones in sick, lying and using the death of a family member as an excuse. I wish she had phoned in sick this time!!!

According to the midwife 30 mins was the quickest she could of gotten her to the surgical ward claiming that the lifts were busy, now its a small hospital, split over 2 floors, it couldn't of taken that long to get her down 1 floor.

Things certainly don't add up, I have no idea if the loss of the close family member affected the midwife's decision making or judgment but the fact that she left that little detail out of her report speaks volumes.

Is this a mountain out of a mole hill or should this be looked into further?

Thanks for reading this and any advice is welcome xx.

I'm so sorry about the loss of your friends baby.

Without knowing the details all I can say is that 30 mins is not an unreasonable time to transfer a patient to a different ward, it can take much longer at times.

It's not necessarily just about lifts, although that can have a small impact I suppose, but the receiving ward has to be ready to take the patient that they're admitting. This may include but isn't limited to, transferring a patient from their ward to elsewhere, moving an existing patient from their current bedspace to a different part of the ward which may in turn require another patient to be moved so you can have a bit of musical beds going on. They may need certain equipment by the bed ready for the patient too and with the best will in the world, it can take time. This is all dependent on the staff being able to stop doing what they're doing to get the practicalities organised straight away.
We like the patients that are most unwell to be close to the nurses station so they're being observed as closely as possible. Those closer to discharge will be further away as they're well into their recovery, hence the need for bed shifting.

These things will have been taken into account during the investigation but bereavement or not, this in itself is probably, I would suggest, a quicker than many.

Sorry - a quicker transfer than many.

If the investigation cleared her of any negligence, why do you think this new information would change things?

If she followed the correct procedures and policies and her actions were deemed appropriate, why would they be now deemed inappropriate because she was bereaved?

I'm not sure what you think it would change. If they had felt she acted inappropriately then the fact she was bereaved might have been considered in mitigation, but it doesn't work the other way around. She may have performed "better" if she hadn't had this on her mind, but the investigation obviously considered that she hadn't performed poorly or they wouldn't have cleared her.

Yes I would pursue this OP. The midwife sounds like she has lots of issues possibly contributing to her being unable to do her job.

Maternity services don't have surgical wards. They have an antenatal ward, labour ward, post natal ward and theatres. If by surgical ward you mean theatre then 30 minutes isn't unusual depending on the situation. If It was an acute emergency then less is the ideal but theatre could have been busy at the time and physically transferring can take a while too.

I wouldn't have thought the death of a family member would change much if she's already been cleared of any wrong doing. It's awful that this has happened to your friend, but I'm sure the midwife feels awful too and it will have stayed with her ever since. Heartbreaking for all of you.

Hospitals investigate maternity incidents and deaths very thoroughly. If the midwife has been cleared of any wrong doing then that is the end of it. It’s hard to say more without details