Mother lost baby after doctors failed to see her face to face
A NEWBORN baby died after a senior doctor failed to see his mother face to face, an investigation has found.
Officials found that maternity staff repeatedly missed chances to save the life of Giles Cooper-hall, who died after a catalogue of errors in the maternity care of his mother at University Hospi- tals Plymouth NHS Trust.
The failings emerged just weeks after the Ockenden report found that more than 200 babies died as a result of failings at Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust.
The latest report highlighted how similar issues at University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust meant staff missed numerous opportunities to save Giles at Derriford Hospital, in the city.
It revealed how his mother Ruth Cooper-hall, then aged 37, was not seen face to face by a consultant when she went into labour in October last year, despite recommendations made in an interim Ockenden report published nearly two years earlier.
A Healthcare Safety Investigation Branch (HSIB) report into the incident, published today, has exposed how inexperienced and over-stretched staff failed to carry out checks, recognise there was an emergency or seek help
from senior doctors until it was too late.
The HSIB report also suggested Giles’s death could have been avoided if staff knew about the care plan for his mother’s labour.
Instead, vital messages were not passed on, with the investigation finding this was likely to be because the staff responsible were “distracted” by other tasks.
In total, the report issued five safety recommendations to the trust in a bid to prevent future deaths.
Mrs Cooper-hall and her wife, Allison Cooper-hall, 39, said the investigation had highlighted “the failures in care, missed opportunities and delay in recognition of the severity and urgency of the situation”.
“Our utter sadness and despair at losing Giles has been joined by anger and hurt as we now know that human error contributed to his death,” they said.
Mrs Cooper-hall alerted staff that her baby was not moving as much as normal when she was 41 weeks pregnant. But she was discharged and reassured the team was “not concerned at all”.
A senior doctor looked at her notes but did not see her in person.
A spokesman for University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust said: “All the [recommendations] from the investigation will be fully implemented.”