"A mix of very opposite experiences"

On the 31st of August our new daughter was born in Aberdeen Maternity Hospital. It was one of the best days in our life.

However we had very opposite experiences there.

My wife had a planned C-section however our daughter decided that she wanted to see the world a bit faster and came four days early.

Staff at the Triage Ward were very good apart from inserting the cannula into my wifes vein as this was successful after 3 trials.

Staff at the theatre before, during and after the section was amazing. Totally professional and I have never seen something so amazing as those people working together. My wife was constantly assured and we filled like in good hands.

Everything went well and our daughter was born. My wife had been transferred into the recovery ward where she had to spend about 10 hours due to severe bleeding which was driven by very low placenta. The care my wife received on this ward on the day shift was completely amazing. A huge thanks needs to be given - one staff member in particular was a complete star on this ward. I have never seen so much compassion and good care.

The situation changed however when night shift started however. The care was not so good anymore but we were transported to Summerfield Ward and this is where the things went very bad.

I had to go as no others can stay overnight and during the pandemic I could be there only 2 hours per day so had booked my allowed slot for next day and went home - this was around 11pm.

My wife was still not walking by her own at that time as she still had a catheter due to prolonged bleeding she experienced before. She was therefore completely depending on the help of the night shift staff. This was however far from good.

My daughter was crying as was needing to be fed but when my wife called for staff to take her from cot and gave her to my wife she has been told she was fed 2 hours before and it is to often, this happen couple times (thanks to that we experienced a big weight loss of our daughter - over 10% as she was not being fed when she wanted and could not push my wife to produce more milk)

Cleaning lady helped my wife in the morning to change the bedding as midwives didn't even check this and her bedding was all in blood due to bleeding she had. My wife had been advised at this stage that she could complain to the manager but we decided to do this later after discharge.

There was also an incident when my wife dropped the buzzer and called for help for 20 minutes and no one heard her which was a bit strange due to the fact how quiet it is at night.

Final bit of our experience was when we were adhered to the hospital back to Summerfield Ward when our daughter was weighed by one of the midwives at home and her weight was showing over 12% loss. This was however a fault of the scale at hospital, her weight was completely fine. This time however, the lady who looked after us was a star again with great compassion and highly professional.

To summarize

- C-section and triage staff was great, highly professional and provided us with great care

- recovery day shift again great night shift not so good

- Summerfield ward - night shift was a nightmare, it gave my wife experience she will never forget in a highly negative way, day shift a few days later was completely different.