"A failure of communication"

St John’s hospital, Livingston

Great care from the midwifery team, but I have a few concerns following my experience.

After hours of labour, at 9cm dilation I was told to stop pushing as the baby was at a funny angle and in distress. I was told that we needed to go to theatre for forceps and, failing that, a caesarean. I was exhausted and on various forms of pain relief, and my husband was in the bathroom putting on covers for the surgery when I was asked to sign the consent form for the surgery. I do not feel that I was fit to sign the consent form and think this should not have happened while my husband was not in the room. Before going into labour I was clear that I did not want forceps, which to me is evidence that I was not fit to consent as I would not have said ok to the use of forceps if I was. My husband knew this and had he been in the room he would have been able to make that clear. Luckily they did not use the forceps in the end, but it worries me that with the rush to theatre and my state at the time it is only luck that they were not used.

Following the caesarean, as I was being stitched up on the operating table, the doctor was debriefing me that the surgery went well. Again, my husband was not in the room (he was with our baby in a side room as she needed to receive oxygen) and I was not fit to receive this information. I understand the doctor was trying to be reassuring when they said that a future pregnancy would not necessarily have to be a caesarean, but it was very upsetting at the time; I was still on the operating table, my baby was in the other room receiving treatment, in that moment talking about a future pregnancy did not feel appropriate. No doctor debriefed me the next day after my surgery, that was it - I was debriefed while still on the operating table and with my husband in another room.

This poor communication continued as my baby was kept in hospital for several days to receive antibiotics. It was never explained to us why she needed this, it was only on seeing the discharge papers that stated suspected sepsis.

Overall my care was very good, but a failure of communication in certain instances meant I left the hospital with many questions about what happened to me. It is only since going through my notes with a midwife that I have cleared up these questions about what happened, but I wanted to raise my concerns about consent and communication in the hopes that other women are not left feeling upset and confused about their birth experience as I was.