"Dangerous and neglectful care."

We welcome comments which help us to improve the quality of your experience during pregnancy, labour and postnatally. We would also like to apologise that your experience fell short of the high standard of care that we aim to provide throughout our maternity services.

The attendances at any maternity unit is unpredictable and at times can put excessive demands on the service. We strive to manage these peaks in activity, with safety our overriding priority.

The Triage service is open 24 hours per day, 7 days a week, enabling continuous access for women who have pregnancy related problems which require assessment and are unable to wait for the next available clinic or GP appointment. Most women self refer, however we also see women via their GP or community midwife. It is discussed with all women that there may be a wait to be seen as we do not have an appointment system. Triage operates similar to A&E, where women are triaged and then prioritised dependent upon their need. This means some patients have longer waits than others.

The midwife taking your phone call discusses your concerns. As the Triage area is within the labour ward, the security of our women and baby’s is paramount and you will ring a bell for access. There may be a short wait to answer this and we apologise that there was an extra wait on this occasion. You are greeted on admission by a member of staff who notifies the triage midwife of your arrival. If you are in established labour, care will be transferred to a labour ward midwife. If at this time there are a number of women accessing the service you may then need to wait until a midwife is available to do a full assessment, which may include review by medical staff.

Whilst our new labour ward is under development, we have aimed to maximise clinical space on the current labour ward and therefore acknowledge that the waiting room is smaller than that which will be available in the facility due to open in the autumn. We appreciate we have a limited number of spaces in the current waiting room but are able to provide extra chairs and refreshments if required.

Once again we apologise that the experience you received at the Leighton Maternity unit which fell short of the high standards that we are striving to deliver and if you would like to discuss any aspects of this further, please contact Pam Cornwall, Head of Midwifery on 01270 278013.