Maternity unit closure 'would hit dale families'

PUBLIC MEETING: Jo Crawford, head of midwifery

CONCERN has been raised that expectant mums in Teesdale will have to travel much further to have their babies if the maternity unit at Darlington Memorial Hospital is shut.
The unit is among several in the region involved in a major shake-up through the NHS’s Better Health Programme (BHP).
One proposal suggests there may only be one consultant-led maternity unit in the area stretching from Teesdale to Middlesbrough.
The changes could lead to the closure of several existing units, of which Darlington is one. But people are being told that longer travelling distances will not lead to babies being born in the back of ambulances. Regional NHS bosses say the changes are necessary because there are not enough junior doctors to fill rotas and a swathe of midwives is due to retire.
Teesdale county councillor Richard Bell suggested the NHS was concentrating services in the Tees Valley and forgetting outlying rural areas.
He said: “This is not the Tees Valley. This is not the surrounding areas. This is an area of its own.”
He added that Darlington Hospital is about 30 minutes from Middleton-in-Teesdale and even longer for people further up the dale.
He said people in Teesdale had been promised Darlington would retain its maternity unit after the one at Bishop Auckland Hospital closed.
Cllr Bell said the crucial issue for people in Teesdale was “where this new unit is located”.
The NHS wants fewer units so that more specialists are concentrated in particular areas.
People from Teesdale were given the opportunity to have a say during an engagement session at The Hub, in Barnard Castle, last Thursday. Prof Jonathan Wyllie, director of neonatology at James Cook University Hospital, gave a dire warning should changes not be made.
He said: “Being spread out and not being able to attract people, I think, puts us in danger.”
A range of other health bosses, including head of midwifery for the County Durham and Darlington Foundation Trust Jo Crawford, and clinical chairman for Durham Dales, Easington and Sedgefield Clinical Commissioning Group Dr Jonathan Smith, presented the problems faced.
They said more expectant mums were being classed as high risk because increasing numbers of older women, women with long-term health issues, and overweight women were falling pregnant.
Changes in official guidance have also lowered the threshold by which pregnant women are considered high risk.
High risk mums-to-be must be managed by a consultant, who must be available 24 hours a day.
Health bosses now say that they are thinking of having one consultant-led unit alongside a midwifery-led unit – or two consultant-led units alongside midwifery-led units, one of which would also include highly specialist maternity services.
Whatever the outcome, several maternity units in the area will close.
NHS spokesman Edmund Lowell said people’s views would be considered when the proposals are eventually put to consultation.
Health bosses have gone further to reassure people that babies will not be born in the back of ambulances in lay-bys because of increases in distances.
A spokesman said: “It is unlikely that this would be the case. Very few babies arrive so quickly that there is not time to get to a hospital.
“The benefits of going to a centre where the right specialist staff are on hand would outweigh the disadvantages of the additional travelling time.”
Those at the meeting were also worried that NHS bosses were talking to the wrong people during the engagement session.
Barnard Castle town councillor Judi Sutherland was cheered when she suggested the people at the event could not give relevant feedback because very few were women of child-baring age.
She suggested toddler groups and other young family groups would be better suited to give views.
Mr Lowell said a group called Volunteer Organisation Network North East would be having “50 conversations” with targeted groups, such as playgroups.
Those attending learned there are plans to create a “surgery only centre” at either Darlington or North Tees hospitals to alleviate pressure on accident and emergency (A&E) wards and to ensure patients can be scheduled for surgery without risk of cancellation because of emergency cases.
It has previously been reported that there are also proposals to cut the number of A&E departments in the region, and either Darlington or North Tees will be affected.