The Bristol mother and baby

I really do not know whether anyone is to blame for this tragedy, or whether anythihg might have prevented it.

I would hazard a guess that, in this world of specialisms, the midwives were probably not well-versed in the risks of mental illness.

I am sure that there will be some sort of enquiry and let us hope that this will highlight any changes needed and that these will be passed on to other maternity units.

If the system there is as barmy as it is here, then getting another specialist to see a patient involves going back through the GP. Once upon a time you just had a chat with your colleague over lunch in the hospital cantten and they would hop up to the ward to give an opinion.

Rowantree
There are also a lot of agency nurses on evening shifts and I don't think that was so much the case years ago (though please correct me if that's not the case).

When I had DD2 over 30 years ago there was one agency nurse on night shift for the whole ward. When DD spent the whole evening crying and would not be comforted, this nurse slopped into my room in her flip-flops. I thought, oh good, she's going to help me, perhaps soothe DD and take her to the nursery so that I can get some sleep! Oh, no, she just asked me if I had a magazine she could borrow and went back to her office and shut the door.

The girl's partner had been in to see her and, according to the local news, she had come off her medication as she wanted to breastfeed. The nursing staff went in to check her just 30 minutes later and found she had gone.

So unbelievably sad.

I just still feel so sad - I haven't the emotional space to feel angry. Of course there will be a proper investigation and I absolutely agree the staff will be feeling dreadful. Eleo is so right - we can't manage risk away, we can only manage it. Let's wait and see and have a bit of compassion for everyone involved.

jingle You say without people making a fuss there wouldn't be an investigation, but in a serious matter such as this I think an investigation procedure would automatically be set in motion.

Until all the facts are known, how can you say who, if anyone, is to blame? Even if a person or persons are found to have made mistakes, who in their lives can say they have never made a mistake or lost concentration in a situation where it could have resulted in something serious happening?

Every minute they are on duty, doctors and nurses have responsibility for other people's lives and, with the best will in the world, sometimes mistakes are made especially if workplaces are understaffed. Also, it is impossible to predict every single eventuality. It is sometimes only after something unusual happens that policies and procedures are altered.

As others have said, the people on duty on that day must be feeling awful enough as it is, without others flinging accusations around about their supposed negligence.

Sorry I have missed a whole page of posts
That was in response to jingl's post of 12:37

Well that's obvious jingl

Might be as well to remember that rushing to judgment is what people did in the Middle Ages. This is the twenty-first century, when in this country at least, we are supposed to have moved on from witch-hunting and summary justice.

I don't know jingl but I hoped hey don't. I don't know how it would help - I'm sure this is not the fault of one or two individuals. There was a recent case where social workers were named and castigated by a judge and I found this worrying. Would anyone go into a demanding job such as social work or nursing if they risk being publicly blamed in this way? I believe in accountability but not in witch hunts.

How can you not point the finger at individuals?

I think your anger is understandable jingl and it's hard not to feel desperately sad about this tragedy and to feel so frustrated that someone couldn't have done something to stop it. I am trying to withold judgment until the facts are known, but as someone who has worked in both child protection and mental health I'm only too aware of the gaps in both and more specifically, between the two fields.

The poor mother seems to have been kept in hospital for longer than the norm, which I suspect must have been due to her mental health issues as there is no reason to think she was not physically fit for discharge. I am thinking that she was probably being assessed by her usual team and perhaps consideration was given to arranging a mental health act assessment. However perhaps the risk signs were not there to warrant this. Not every mother with schizophrenia would be a risk to their baby or have inpatient care, particularly if other family members are supportive as they seemed to be in this case. I believe she left immediately after the baby's father left after visiting, and I have read that he said she was 'sleep deprived but happy', so it doesn't appear that he had any major concerns at that point. Having already experienced psychosis she would have been at higher than normal risk of puerperal psychosis, and this can come on very rapidly, so who knows what was going through her mind to make her walk out in such a way.

I am surprised that a woman carrying a baby could walk past members of staff without being challenged, but again I will try to reserve judgment on this as I don't know the facts. I may not feel as angry as 'jingl' but I do feel immensely frustrated and wonder how the hell this could have happened. I accept that the staff wil feel dreadful, but that is no reason not to hold a full enquiry without, hopefully, pointing the finger at individuals.

If I were to get emotional about every baby who died yesterday, I'd probably need to kill myself. Right now I'm going to walk away from your disdain and misdirected anger.

Really? You think so? There is nothing "powerful" in using a hackneyed modern expression.

I have not dismissed anything, just expressed something awful in a powerful way.

How can anyone dismiss that child's death as "shit happening"? Words fail me.

crossed posts, anniez.

But shit will happen sometimes. We can't prevent all of it.

I wouldn't disagree Jingl but awful things happen, that's life and someone isn't always to blame directly.

I imagine the staff in that hospital and maternity ward are beside themselves with grief and guilt, we don't need to add to it. There will of course be an enquiry and possibly someone will lose their job. They might never get over it.

Remember that receptionist/nurse who answered the phone from the Australian jokers who managed to get through to the Royal, whoever it was. The nurse committed suicide and one of the radio announcers has never worked again I believe. I'm not an eye for an eye person and I think that those who choose to work in the health service are the kind of people who care deeply and try to do their best despite everything. I wouldn't want to be in their shoes.

Anger sets in after the shock and horror. It's the natural process.

Shit doesn't have to happen! That is a pathetic thing to say about this.

Where was the care that child was entitled to?

I don't think misdirected or undirected anger is useful to anyone. Shit happens. No point getting angry or blaming anyone until all the 'causes' and facts of the case are known. Sad, yes. Angry, no.

But carry on being too clever for your own good on here. If something goes wrong in an old people's home all hell lets loose on Gransnet.

Once a story is in the public domain people are bound to comment. I don't think it is wrong to discuss what could/should/might have happened. It's human nature to have an opinion.

It's off-putting to post what is only an opinion and not a judgement (which we are all entitled to) and then have to endure a public wrist slapping.

Someone let that baby down somewhere in a helluva big way. And yes, I will be bloody angry. If no one was ever angry and kicked up a fuss there would never be investigations and nothing would change.

I don't feel judgemental or angry with the hospital because I think it is such a devastating thing to happen that I can't believe the medical staff feel anything other than absolutely awful.

I also remember being in hospital with a newborn (a glorious two whole weeks with my first in the 1980s) and longing to get out of a stuffy atmosphere into some air. You can't castigate a whole system when one person does something dreadful.

The problem is the 'Blame Culture'. and it is there , it's now the norm.

How many times has the 'Blame Culture' surfaced without facts being known, it's trial by non jury only based on the need to 'get at' something or somebody to provide an immediate answer to an occurrence.

I am not letting the hospital off, I am not letting the staff off, for all I know they were at fault and have a lot to answer for. However I am waiting to hear what happened after the heat has been taken out of the equation and a proper conclusion has been made.

You know sometimes a 'tragedy' is what it is and it doesn't always have to have blame apportioned to it but an understanding of how it happened needs to be known to make sense of it all.