Maternity survey results
The results of a national survey published today have given us valuable insight into women's experiences of the maternity services at Queen's Medical Centre and Nottingham City Hospital.
248 women who have received maternity care at NUH took part in the survey, which asked mothers about their experience before, during and after labour in January and February 2017.
NUH's scores were 'about the same' as other hospitals in the areas of antenatal care and labour and birth.
There was a statistically significant improvement in the areas of skin to skin contact, staff responding quickly if attention was needed after birth and cleanliness standards, from our 2015 scores.
Post-natal care was identified as an area for improvement, specifically in areas such as frequency of midwife visits and the information provided during these appointments.
Joy Payne, Director of Midwifery said:
"We are always grateful to receive feedback from mothers who use our maternity service. External surveys and the questionnaires we carry out internally allow us to evaluate the maternity service and highlight areas for further improvement.
"We have already made changes as a result of feedback, including the introduction of more robust systems in the community for discussions around mental health and additional infant feeding training for staff, though these results indicate there remains more to do.
"We will be redesigning the antenatal care service we provide, which will include dedicated birth planning appointments, further parent education sessions and an improved access to patient information so community midwives are aware of any previous medical history. These latest results show we need to continue to invest more resources in post-natal care and information for mothers.
"We are delighted that the hard work of our maternity team has seen scores improve in many areas of our service, such as women feeling they have enough information about the different options for birth and women being involved in decisions about care in labour.
"We are committed to improving the experience of women who use our maternity service and we will use this feedback to further experiences as a way of improving the care we provide."
NUH receives feedback in a multitude of different ways, including the Care Opinion website, the Friends and Family Test, complaints and comments posted via social media.