Midwifery team’s national accolade
WARRINGTON And Halton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust’s (WHH) maternity service has been named Midwifery Service Of The Year in the Royal College Of Midwives’ national awards held in London.
The team triumphed over competition from Barking, Havering And Redbridge University Hospitals, Lancashire Teaching Hospitals and NHS Highland.
The national award follows hot on the heels of the trust’s annual Thank You staff awards held at the Parr Hall on March 3 where the maternity service bagged another team of the year title.
Earlier in the year the service reached the finals of the national Health Service Journal awards in the patient safety category.
This was in recognition of its ‘Learning From When Things Go Wrong’ overhaul of the last two years.
Regulator the Care Quality Commission had graded the maternity service as ‘requires improvement’ in 2015.
A WHH spokeswoman said Learning From When Things Go Wrong programme involved a ‘difficult, often emotional, journey to rebuild the service and restore the confidence of women and their families as well as its workforce over the past two years’.
To this end, the team developed the Your Pregnancy, Your Birth, Your Choice campaign, which kick-started change by working closely with patients and former patients to overhaul the service.
The final leg of the turnaround was the launch of the midwifery-led unit in May 2016, the spokeswoman said.
In a separate category Katherine Conquest was ‘highly commended’ in the excellence in ● maternity care category for her maternity acupuncture service, which WHH said was the only one of its type provided by a midwifery service in the country.
Mel Pickup, WHH chief executive, said “We couldn’t be more proud of our maternity team who so deserve this national, independent recognition.
“Two years of sustained focus and energy has seen the whole team work together to rebuild their unit, restore patient and public confidence and the pride and passion of its workforce.
“Our team delivers quality, safe and compassionate maternity care and our ladies and their families consistently highly recommend this trust as a place to give birth and enjoy a superior patient experience.
“This award is a testament to the team’s sheer hard work and determination to turn their service around and make things better for patients, families and staff.”