"The bereavement midwife. My honesty of..."

What I liked

The bereavement midwife.

My honesty of the staff after the death of my daughter.

The meetings with consultant have gone well since. Consultant is genuinely devastated about out experience.

My partner found The Treatment Centre good.

What could be improved

After a mis diagnosis that nearly cost my partner his life and now a stillborn baby I hope you will forgive me for my absolute lack of faith and trust in Leighton Hospital. My partner was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease after being admitted into Leighton. He deteriorated and developed sepsis and other complications, they said he had an abnormal appendix but this was not the root cause. He was treated in HDU and sent home within a week. His symptoms began flaring up two monthly, thank god he had a ‘flare up’ down south where he works. He was recently admitted into a hospital down south where they removed his appendix. The consultant said I don’t think you had or have ever had Crohn’s and advised him to stop taking his medication prescribed by a Leighton consultant. He could have quite easily died if his appendix was not removed-it was in such a state that he now has a nine inch scar because it was stuck to his liver. How could Leighton have missed this? My partner has been fine ever since the removal of his appendix at the down South hospital.

Anything else?

While all the stress of my partner having ‘so called Crohn’s’ was going on, I was pregnant with out first child, a daughter. I developed pre-eclampsia and was not so lucky to be down south at the time. I was admitted into Leighton were I feel a catalogue of errors led to my baby girl’s death. I was given a fast acting version of the drug nifedipine which lowers blood pressure rapidly (twice in 24 hours) this aggravated the blood flow to my baby and my concerns and questions regarding the safety of this drug were not listened to. I asked if it was safe-they said yes. I have since found out it isn’t safe at all. My baby made 100 movements on the sonogram upon entry to the hospital and only 5 movements the night before she died. I cried to midwives saying ‘My baby isn’t moving as much’ my concerns were either brushed off or ignored. Surely I was in hospital to monitor the baby? Surely my concerns should have been listened to? I had no say whatsoever in my care, I was given a lethal concoction of drugs, ignored and left to wait for hours before being seen to. My baby’s heartrate was not checked once in the night. Nobody-except myself was noticing mine or the baby’s deterioration. What was I in this hospital for? The showers were also filthy, one morning there was a pool of blood on the floor of one cubicle-I did flag this up with a midwife. Appalling. The bed I was in resembled something from the first world war, rickety and had to be forced into place up and down every half an hour-by myself or my poor partner and mother that had to sit by and watch this terrible horror story unfold.