Trust Board Febuary 2010 - Sandwell & West Birmingham Hospitals

SWBTB (2/10) 045 (a)
Table 3: Short Listed Options
Option Description
1 Transfer all births and consultant activity to City Hospital and retain low risk Midwifery led
antenatal services at Sandwell and City Hospitals including routine screening (scans).
There would be no births at Sandwell Hospital and all Consultant antenatal clinics would
transfer to City Hospital concentrating all high risk care to one site. All Neonatal care would
be provided at City Hospital.
2 All births and in-patient maternity care would be located at City Hospital. There would also
be a full range of antenatal services at City Hospital. A small number of Consultant
antenatal clinics would remain at Sandwell Hospital along with a full range of Midwifery
antenatal services including routine screening. There would be no births or inpatient
maternity care at Sandwell Hospital. High risk in-patient care will be provided at City
Hospital. All Neonatal care would be provided at City Hospital.
3 All consultant led care and, all in-patient services and, temporarily all births would transfer
to City Hospital. A Stand Alone Midwifery Led Birth Centre would be developed within
Sandwell and, once operational, some midwifery led low risk births would relocate to the
new centre in Sandwell. Low risk midwifery led antenatal care and routine screening will be
available in Sandwell and at City Hospital. Consultant led antenatal care would be relocated
to City Hospital. All Neonatal care would be provided at City Hospital.
Do
Minimum
Retain all consultant led and maternity services at Sandwell Hospital and improve
standards. There would be no change to the current service model with the requirement to
improve the facilities to achieve the recommended standards, and also the need to improve
clinical leadership, operational management and workforce capacity.
4.2 Stand Alone Birth Centre
A midwifery led unit or birth centre is a place that offers care to women with a predefined uncomplicated
pregnancy and where midwives are the lead professional for ante-natal, intra-partum and post natal
care. A stand alone birth centre is a midwifery led birth centre set up in a location away from and on a
different site to a Consultant led unit.
Medical services including obstetric, neonatal and anaesthetic care are available in a Consultant led
unit.
A review of available literature and research around midwifery led birth centres suggests that there are
many benefits of giving birth in a midwifery led birth centre for women who are healthy and have a
straight forward (low-risk) pregnancy. These are similar to the benefits of home birth. National policy is
to increase women’s choice for place of birth and access to midwife-led care and in England the policy is
that from 2009 access to a birth centre will be ‘guaranteed’. The Trust will be in a position to provide
such access from April 2010 through the co-located Birth Centre at City Hospital. The main additional
benefit of a stand alone birth centre within Sandwell would be more local access for Sandwell women.
Other identified benefits to delivering in a stand alone birth centre include:
• High levels of normal births
• Low levels of caesarean sections
• Higher levels of intact perineum
• Lower episiotomy rates
• More babies remaining with their mothers
• Lower transfer rates for women
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