New Cross Hospital: Expectant mothers could be turned away as Wolverhampton hospital introduces a birthing cap
Mothers-to-be could be turned away from New Cross Hospital as health chiefs look to cap the number of births at its maternity unit.
The facility is currently working at a ratio of 32 women to one midwife, according to Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust.
The unit has a 5,000-births-a-year capacity but this figure had already been reached by September – with a 17 per cent increase in births in August this year compared to the same month in 2016.
Now, trust chief executive David Loughton has asked for a cap on the number of births at the hospital. It is not yet known how many will be allowed.
The unit currently accepts expectant mothers from Walsall Manor, Telford’s Princess Royal Hospital and the midwife-led unit at County Hospital in Stafford, which replaced a consultant-led facilty in January last year.
Speaking at a meeting of the trust board on Monday, Mr Loughton said: “We are now at the upper limit of what we can safely do. Unfortunately, I’ve had to write to all of the commissioners asking to cap the number of births.
“When the unit at Staffordshire closed we took on a number of extra births.
“We are also seeing an increase of women coming to our maternity department because they are not choosing to go to the midwife-led unit at Stafford. This is because if there is a problem, they haven’t got access to a consultant unit and can’t be seen by a doctor there.
“On top of that, we accepted 500 deliveries from the Walsall unit. Then we had what I call ‘booking drift’ where the numbers we accepted grew with us accepting births from Telford.”
The meeting heard how women are calling up the trust to ask to give birth at the hospital.
Mr Loughton continued: “We are now having women calling up crying on the phone saying they want to come here, but if we don’t have space it’s not safe.”
Refugee and asylum-seeking women are also a concern of the trust, as bosses say they are not engaging with ante-natal services before arriving at hospital.
Mr Loughton said: “The level to which these women engage with antenatal services is low, even though there is only a small number of them.
“They instead do not present until delivery meaning if there are any difficulties, they have to be dealt with there and then.”
In the last three months, the number of mothers giving birth at New Cross has increased from 449 in July to 469 in August and 479 in September.
