The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has rated the maternity service at Russells Hall Hospital as good following an inspection in April.
The inspection was carried out as part of CQC’s national maternity inspection programme.
The programme aims to provide an up-to-date view of the quality of hospital maternity care across the country, and a better understanding of what is working well to support learning and improvement at a local and national level.
Inspectors only looked at the areas of safe and well-led in the maternity service. Following the inspection, the overall rating for maternity, as well as the areas of safe and well-led, have moved up from requires improvement to good.
The overall rating for the trust remains as requires improvement.
Carolyn Jenkinson, deputy director of secondary and specialist healthcare, said:
“When we inspected maternity services at The Dudley Group NHS Foundation Trust, we were pleased to see widespread improvements in the quality of care being provided to women, people using the service and their babies, however, understaffing often affected the timeliness of care and treatment being provided.
“Staff were proud of the organisation and spoke highly of the supportive and inclusive culture with leaders that were visible and approachable. All staff were focused on providing the best possible care and were proactive in addressing any health inequalities.
“It was reassuring to see safety champions regularly reviewing incidents as well as doing frequent walk rounds of the service to observe and offer support to staff.
“The service should be commended for how well staff considered the needs of women and people using the service with protected characteristics. For example, staff ensured people with neuro-disabilities got additional help with their birth plans to support their individual needs. We were also told about an occasion where a British sign language interpreter was organised to support a woman for the whole of their labour.
“However, leaders need to continue to mitigate the impact of understaffing in the service. Often staff from the maternity ward who cared for women and people before and after birth were deployed to the labour ward to ensure safe care.
“We will continue to monitor the trust, including through future inspections, to ensure women and people using services continue to receive a good standard of care.”
Inspectors found the following during this inspection:
- Nursing and midwifery staff received and kept up to date with their mandatory training
- Staff knew how to identify adults and children at risk of, or suffering, significant harm and worked with other agencies to protect them
- Maternity service areas were clean and had suitable furnishings which were clean and well-maintained
- Students and international midwives we spoke with said they felt supported by the staff team
- Staff followed infection control principles including the use of personal protective equipment
- Staff carried out daily safety checks of specialist equipment. Records showed that resuscitation equipment outside maternity theatres was checked daily.