Trust Board papers November 2012 - Barking Havering and ...

TRUST BOARD MEETING
5 September 2012
Board Room, Trust Headquarters, Queen’s Hospital
Points and Questions raised by members of the Public
at the above Trust Board meeting
Question:
In reference to the Maternity Services
Update report and the transfer of
women to other Trusts with the change
in boundaries, Mr Skillman asked if
patient choice was taken into account
when transferring women, as this had
been highlighted when the Survey was
undertaken regarding the closure of
Maternity Services at King George
Hospital (the vast majority of women
had confirmed in the Survey that they
wanted to give birth at KGH). He was
concerned that there would not be any
patient choice whatsoever if the
proposals came to fruition.
Response/Action:
The Chief Executive confirmed that
there would be a choice for women and
this would be managed by the GPs.
The Trust would want women to be
delivering their babies as close to home
as possible, but it needed to be open
and honest about its capacity issues, to
ensure it was running a safe service. It
was acknowledged that the proposal did
take away some choice for women.
Mr Skillman raised the point that the
number of deliveries at the Trust had
been discussed at the recent Overview
& Scrutiny Committee meeting with
Heather Mullin, as they differed from
the number the Trust was reporting
between Queen’s and the Midwifery
Led Unit (MLU). Mr Skillman noted that
an escalation plan was in place, but he
wanted confirmation that the Trust was
not going backwards, that it had
everything under control, it was not
going to have problems again with the
service and that the figures were not
going to change.
Mr Moloney confirmed that for this year
the Trust was expecting to deliver just
over 9k and the plan for the next
financial year was approximately 8k,
when taking into account activity from
Outer North East London PCTs and
some women from Essex.
Mr Moloney also confirmed that the
figures were not changing, as Heather
Mullin would have been referring to
KGH not running a maternity service at
all (the Trust could deliver 2,500 at
KGH).
Trust Board Meeting (Part I) 5 September 2012