Northumbria Healthcare bucks national trend with positive feedback on postnatal care

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has published the results of its 2021 survey of women’s experiences of maternity care in England.

The responses show that Northumbria Healthcare’s results were ‘much better’ than the majority of trusts for the ‘care in hospital after the birth’ section, with the third highest score

nationally, and ‘better’ than most for the ‘care at home after birth’ section, where it was ranked fifth.

This was despite the overall national results suggesting that the impact of the pandemic has led to poorer experiences for some and exacerbated concerns around the quality of postnatal care, although the majority of women remained positive about the maternity care they received.

In the other six sections of the survey, covering the likes of antenatal care, labour and birth, and care from staff, the trust’s responses placed it in line with the majority of trusts.

Its scores for the ‘start of care in your pregnancy’, ‘your labour and birth’, ‘staff caring for you’ and ‘feeding your baby’ sections placed it in the top 25 nationally.

Northumbria Healthcare’s head of midwifery, Jenna Wall, said: “It is reassuring to see that the overall experience of our patients has been positive throughout their maternity journey and I would like to thank our incredibly hard-working and compassionate staff.

“However, we will not rest on our laurels. Patient-centred care is absolutely what maternity is about and surveys like this as well as the feedback we receive in other ways all help us to make constant improvements to our service.”