Hospital team delivering on antenatal care

The Royal United Hospitals in Bath has been praised for the standards of its antenatal and newborn screening service.

Despite the challenges brought by Covid-19, during the last 18 months the service met all of Public Health England’s service standards, ensuring all appointments took place within set timeframes.

The team provides a range of services, including screening for infectious diseases and fetal anomalies antenatally, tracking of the newborn physical examination and hearing screen for newborns.

Inspectors from the Screening Quality Assurance Service said: “The team identified that your service is very well engaged with quality assurance and with changes and developments to the screening programmes. It was evident that staff are dedicated to ensuring a high level of service for pregnant women and babies.

“We would like to thank you and your team for your continued commitment to screening and to thank you for participating in this process at this challenging time.”

In their report, inspectors highlighted the increased level of digital information available for parents.

Sharon Wilson, deputy screening coordinator, said: “Every three to five years the Quality Assurance Team (QA) carries out an inspection of all the screening services provided by the trust.

“Following the latest inspection, QA reported it was really impressed with the services we provide and made no recommendations at all on where we could improve – though here at the RUH we are always looking at ways we can further improve our service.

“This is a huge achievement for the whole screening team and we would like to thank them all for their commitment and hard work.”