25
Apr 2017
Shrewsbury hospital trust warned a decade ago over baby heart monitoring
It has emerged that the hospital trust being investigated in relation to seven baby deaths over a two year period, was warned ten years ago that it needed to improve its maternity services and that there were issues with the way it carried out foetal heart monitoring.
The Health Care Commission became involved in the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital in 2007, after several families began legal action against the trust following problems they had experienced at the hospital’s maternity unit. Two of the families had babies born with brain injuries as a result of problems with foetal heart monitoring.
Following a review into these cases, the Health Care Commission made several recommendations to the hospital, including a revision of staff training programmes and an audit of CTG monitor traces. However, despite these recommendations, the problems continued.
Five of the seven deaths between September 2014 and May 2016 were caused by a failure to properly monitor the baby’s heart rate.
Following the release of this information, Simon Wright, the trust’s chief executive, said “The loss or serious injury of a baby is the most terrible event imaginable and we again apologise unreservedly to the families involved.
“The trust has carried out investigations into every case to ensure that lessons can be learned and apologise where feedback has been less than a family may wish.
“We are co-operating fully with the review that the Secretary of State has asked NHS England and NHS Improvement to perform to look into the robustness and effectiveness of our investigations into these tragic deaths.
“It would not be appropriate to comment further or to comment on any individuals in relation to any of the cases due to ongoing investigations which we would not wish to prejudice.”
Chadwick Lawrence’s team of medical negligence lawyers have years of experience in high value and complex medical negligence compensation claims and have an excellent record. The team is led by Tony May, a specialist cerebral palsy and birth injury solicitor, who has over 20 years experience in handling cases in which babies have been brain damaged or sustained other injuries as a result of medical negligence. He and his team continue to represent many cerebral palsy children and young adults in medical negligence claims. Tony also acts as the Court of Protection Deputy for many of the cerebral palsy and brain damaged clients that he has represented, so we can continue to support you after your case is settled. Tony can be contacted by email on tonymay@chadlaw.co.uk. Alternatively, please call and speak to any of Chadwick Lawrence’s specialist medical negligence Legal Aid and no win-no fee solicitors for free legal advice on the freephone number below.
Freephone: 0800 028 2969
For further information, please see our cerebral palsy and birth injury website:
http://www.cerebralpalsyclaimssolicitors.co.uk
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