What would you do if you were pregnant and lived in Shropshire?

Regardless of the care you may receive, my advice would be to try to eat well, keep or become a sensible weight, and do anything practical to be fit. All to reduce the chances of needing medical help!

Although this problem is highlighted by maternity care or lack of….I think it’s a generalised problem within the NHS. Too many managers and not enough staff working at the coalface. The appalling waste of money is unbelievable.
If I were in Shropshire I’d want to have offspring elsewhere..but not East Kent. It’s no use harking back to Call the Midwife, that was set in 50s and 60s, things were busy but manageable then. I was nursing in the 60s.

We need to take on serious look at the way the NHS is run and stop treating it as if it was the best health service in the world because it certainly isn't. Stop throwing money at it . I have 3 family members who work in the NHS and they all feel the same

Private births are suggested but did you know that many private hospitals do not have Special Care Baby Units, so a sick baby would be transferred to an NHS unit anyway.
As regards Caesarean births, obviously if one is needed for medical reasons that is fine, but I really do not feel that the NHS should offer cesareans on demand.

I had two children in the 70s, both births based on NCT principles. Both births were fine, midwives were excellent. Dad was allowed to assist by stroking back, administering small amounts of fluid etc.
A few days in maternity ward recovering, very good assistance with breast feeding.
This was Hillingdon Hospital in Middlesex, and then Queen Charlottes.
Both babies disgustingly healthy.

Yet in the 80s. I had a friend who gave birth in a modern maternity hospital and said she would never have more children thanks to the horrendous treatment she received. How awful is that.

PECS The treatment has been excellent but the administrative inefficiency has been time wasting and expensive (to the NHS) money spent dealing with bureacratic systems and all the admin cock-ups that would be better spent on patient care.

I had my first baby in Preston, the hospital was quite large with big wards and I was admitted with high blood pressure at 39 weeks. Three days after my due date they decided to induce labour and it was a horrendous experience. The staff were not very friendly and I had such painful contractions from the drip that by the time my baby was ready to be born I wanted someone to kill me, it all happened within four hours but it felt a lot longer. I was taken the delivery room and baby went into distress so they pulled him out with forceps, his head was very badly bruised and I swear it caused some brain injury because he has traits of antisocial personality disorder. I had issues with my bowels for months afterwards because they had injected local anaesthetic into the perineum and clearly not correctly, and the episiotomy scar caused on and off pain for years. Now forty years later I have a rectocele at the spot where my episiotomy was done. Luckily my subsequent experience of birth was in a lovely cottage hospital with no issues at all.

I was pregnant and living in Shropshire in 1994, my GP had trained in obstetrics, he knew I was unlikely to have an easy delivery and recommended I saw his old boss at North Staffs even though it was a 50 mile round trip.

He told me he had little faith in Telford/Shrewsbury.

Thankfully all was well, I had an elective section at 35 weeks and all was well.

Unfortunately the NHS is run by a load of number crunchers rather than medical staff as was in the past.
Wasn't that long ago that thousands of newly qualified midwives were unable to get jobs once they qualified , because the "budget wouldn't allow any more posts for qualified staff" so they either found a post out of the area or moved on to a non nursing role.
Now most Health authorities are whining about a shortage of midwives!
Until midwifery is taken out of the control of mainly men, or women that are just bothered about numbers this will keep happening in other areas of the country.
The threats or ignoring complaints from anyone, be it staff v staff or patients v staff etc or anti whistleblowing threats must stop now.

In a word?? TERRIFIED

I used to live in mid Wales and was sent to Shrewsbury for my first pregnancy check with my 2nd son. The midwife was rude and abrupt and I felt like a number rather than a person. I was really upset and spoke to my GP who transferred my care to Aberystwyth. They were fantastic, I ended up having to stay in hospital for the last month of pregnancy due to complications. I was induced but I had a problem so was rushed for an emergency c section. The staff were fantastic, helpful, polite, very professional. I even went back to see them with my son when he was 2 months old and they remembered me and the problems I had. I am so glad I changed as I can't imagine the outcome if I was still at Shrewsbury. I feel so sorry for all those affected.

When my daughter was having her first baby, she went into hospital at night with a heavy show. They examined her and said that she wasn’t in labour but they would keep her in because of the show. At 3pm she asked to be examined again because she’d got a feeling of needing to push, but the midwife refused and said there was no way she was in labour. Accepting this (first baby and all that) she went to the toilet. After 15mins of straining, she felt between her legs to find the baby crowning. Emergency buttons then pressed, rushed into delivery, third degree tearing and sepsis was the result. Luckily both she and the baby were ok, but I dread to think of what might have happened!

Pepper59 yes this attitude still persists in all areas. In 1969 when I had my first baby in a big London hospital, I was very well cared for with a small for dates baby and the Consultant's side kick had so much time he danced on the ward for us but I was aware that what would be routine ops for some babies today were not done then and they died. I then had what I think of as two very lucky escapes and feel immense sorrow for the poor mothers in this report.

As she said herself, her own first labour had been very quick and easy, and such people often seemed to assume that if you didn’t experience the same, it was somehow your own fault. I don’t recall whether it was SK who said it, but at around that time I read that ‘how much pain you feel will depend on your own preparation, and your attitude towards labour.’
FGS!!!

At ante-natal classes with DC1 the midwife explaining the birth process and breathing techniques told our large group of pregnant mothers that we would feel "a little discomfort".

Perhaps some might have done, but generally speaking she lied.

Ladyleftfieldlover

Thankfully my three births in Oxfordshire in the 1980s went well. But: I attended NCT classes and the feeling was that if you didn’t have a natural birth with no painkillers you had let the side down! I was lucky and was able to do this. In my ward with my first baby, a young mum had to have an emergency caesarean. She was devastated and felt she had missed out on the real birth experience!

I had mine late 70s and very early 80s, when Sheila Kitzinger’s book (forget the title) was a sort of natural-childbirth bible.

As she said herself, her own first labour had been very quick and easy, and such people often seemed to assume that if you didn’t experience the same, it was somehow your own fault. I don’t recall whether it was SK who said it, but at around that time I read that ‘how much pain you feel will depend on your own preparation, and your attitude towards labour.’
FGS!!!

All the various professions in NHS have to work to the standards set by their own professional bodies. A manager can't overrule clinicians adhering to their own specific set of standards. Trying to pull all of these together, make them work smoothly and still be economical must be well nigh impossible especially when individual personalities come into play.

Does anyone have figures on how many births there were in total at the hospital during this period under a cloud?

I ask because 2 of our grandchildren were born there (2008 and 2018) and the care was exceptional in both cases although I was certainly concerned in 2018 when the pregnancy was revealed.

I am sorry your experience has not been good M0nica
My brother, who lives with us, was unexpectedly diagnosed with kidney failure during the first lockdown , went quickly onto dialysis and then got the call for a transplant team and had a transplant. All this took place during the height of the pandemic. It has been faultless. The cost of his treatment , past & ongoing is huge & beyond our finances & possibly excluded in any general health insurance.
We need to fix the NHS and make sure it is fit to meet the needs of us all. Money will be part of it but it needs structural change too.
It is easy to say it is not working etc ..and it isn't in some places, but it does stunning work in very many areas. Let's not lose sight of the positives.

I live in Shropshire and several of the young mothers we have met at the playgroup we take our DGS to have opted to have their babies across the border in Wrexham.Saying that Wrexham isn’t without its own problems but not the situation at SATH trust.

It’s a terrible situation and so sad to see what was an amazing service 30 years ago is in such a state now.

I think there are deep structural problems in the NHS that lead to it being appallingly badly organised and the only solution anyone can come up for it is to throw more money at it.

Over the last 10 years, both DD and DH have been very seriously ill, DD twice and I have been with them as they negotiated the system, and while they are both in good health now, the frustration pain and sheer inefficiency of the NHS made their conditions much more difficult to bear.

Among the problems is each department is its own little kingdom, which seem not to talk to each other, leading to constant overlaps and also huge gaps which patients fall through. You need to be strong and healthy to make sure that you get the treatment you need. DH

On top of that is a layer of management like a thick layer of custard, who cannot fully penetrate these medical empires so dodge round the edges making futile rules.

I won't bore you with examples of the sheer time and money wasting stupidity we went through during both their treatments, especially as the appalling events in Shropshire are a classic example of what I am saying. Midwives and obstreticians seemed to have had a brick wall between them, erected by midwives, each ruling their little empire and having very little to do with each other, while management failed to pick up the problems or understand them, because they too could only walk round the outside of theseclinical castles and anything they did either didn't address the issue or made it worse because they did not fully know what was going wrong, in all the petty chiefdoms in the clinical departments

If the NHS was a commercial company it would go into administration within a year. Privitisation is not the solution, but root and branch reform of how it is run is, so that clinical practice and management are integrated and work together, that departments work together laterally and all of them realise that the NHS should be run for the benefits of the patients not the convenience of the hospital.

Attitudes to women patients in healthcare settings needs to change.

This.

Many years ago when I lived in Norway, as a middle-aged woman my then doctor referred me to a particular consultant. In his referral letter (they allow you to read them prior to posting) he wrote "This lady is sensible and pragmatic. She does not suffer neurosis and has no anxiety issues. I believe her diffused discomfort and pain may be the result of xxxxx and would urge that she is seen as soon as possible."

He was quite open about the fact that, had I been a man, he would not have written such a comment and that the prevailing attitude towards women, particularly middle-aged women, in matters 'medical' was that they were, by and large, neurotic!

What happened in Shropshire doesn't surprise me. Women are not listened to. And it's universal.

Had I lived in Shropshire when I started my family, I would not be here now. My first birth was very difficult and traumatic with huge blood loss throughout, fortunately I was in Worcestershire and survived, just! Maternity services throughout the NHS need a big shakeup, Shropshire is the tip of the iceberg.

I had my first baby in London and my second in Holland. The care in London was far superior. The procedure in Holland was archaic - they bound my stomach after the birth and I had to lie flat on my back for 12 hours. They fed my baby with a bottle before bringing him to be breast fed.
It is not always better elsewhere!

silverlining I found that really dreadful... and also which good midwife us going to apply to work there unless assured there is a completely new team? Pleased my DDs have had babies & that said " babies" are not having babies themselves. Though locally my DDs experience was 100% fine.

It has made me think about how I just accepted what happened to me in the mid 70s. I am 5'2" and under the current layers of blubber, quite petite. I eventually delivered a back to back, brow presentation 9lb3oz baby by use of venteuse/ forceps. I was rushed straight to surgery for signifigant repair and to stem a haemorrhage. I had a transfusion & eventually left hospital 12 days later. Fortunately my DD was healthy & I delivered a second healthy 8lb 13 oz baby 2 years later with only the need for 2 stitches.
I do have a problem with the scar tissue which is not anywhere comparable to the dreadful impact of women / children in the Shropshire case. There but for the grace....etc.

Our local hospital is like everywhere else it seems, chronic staff shortages. A young friend who arrived in their own car, in advanced Labour recently, was directed to another hospital 15 miles away because our maternity unit had no beds. Fortunately she and her baby were ok.
The shortage of midwives, doctors, nurses is directly linked to our government.
The culture at Staffordshire was down to staff.