York Hospital maternity services concerns

Leigh Day clinical negligence team, who have recently opened a new base in Leeds, say the acknowledgment by the trust that a lot of work needs to be done to prepare a plan of action for the Care Quality Commission (CQC) is reassuring.

It is reported that the CQC will be issuing a full report in January 2023 following inspections in October and November.

The BBC Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) reports that the CQC wrote to the York and Scarborough trust to raise concerns about maternity services at York Hospital, “specifically in relation to governance processes, and assessing and responding to risks for patients". Trust chief executive Simon Morritt told a trust board meeting that no separate concerns had been raised about Scarborough Hospital. LDRS reported Mr Morritt’s comments that the CQC feedback was “concerning and disappointing” and there was "an awful lot of work to do in a relatively short space of time" to submit a plan of action to the watchdog”. He said the board recognised that there were “challenges in maternity”.

The maternity inspections followed a CQC inspection of York Hospital which resulted in the trust being issued with a warning notice and told to make urgent improvements.

Separately, up to 200 maternity units in England are being inspected by the CQC following a series of maternity scandals across the country.

Leigh Day head of clinical negligence Suzanne White said:

“It is reassuring to read that the trust board has woken up to the challenges that it faces in maternity care at York Hospital. However, we would have hoped, in light of the several other maternity care scandals that have been exposed across the country, that every trust would be actively seeking to find out for themselves if their services are good enough.

“As clinical negligence specialist lawyers, we want to see maternity services improved so that families no longer need to seek us out with the message that they don’t want others to suffer in the same way they have.

“That is the message we hear from families who come to us for help at our London and Manchester offices. Now we have a base in Yorkshire, my home county, so that we will be closer to families in the Leeds and York area.”

Leigh Day clinical negligence team can be contacted at https://www.leighday.co.uk/our-services/medical-negligence/ 

The Leeds office of Leigh Day is at Pinnacle, 18th floor 67 Albion Street, Leeds, West Yorkshire LS1 5AA.