Maternity crisis - Funding and staff must be increased

EXPECTANT mothers have reason to be worried over today’s revelation that a second hospital may have to limit the number of babies it delivers because of serious shortcomings in the maternity service.

In this prosperous era, pregnant women are entitled to expect the highest quality of gynaecological and obstetric service. Thus, it is alarming to hear the tone of utter frustration behind criticism voiced by a senior consultant at Limerick Regional Maternity Hospital.

Pulling no punches, Dr Jerry Burke, consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist, has described access to consultants there as “just about the lousiest in the whole of Britain and Ireland”.

His warning that restrictions may have to be imposed on the number of births unless the Department of Health comes up with the necessary resources follows last week’s shock decision by the National Maternity Hospital at Holles Street in Dublin to put a cap on its delivery numbers.

Despite the compelling case for extra resources by maternity hospitals, the Government has provided little. Though it has seen a steady rise in the birth rate during seven years in power, the Coalition is accused of sitting on its hands.

After only five weeks in office, the maternity fiasco has landed on the desk of Health Minister Mary Harney. It would be foolhardy of any politician to dismiss the repeated warnings as sabre rattling. With lives at stake, neither Ms Harney nor the Government can afford to ignore repeated calls for extra staff and resources to be ploughed into the maternity area.

It is time the Government recognised that when doctors and nurses, people at the cliff face of healthcare, highlight the alarming scale of the maternity crisis, they do so, not for political kudos but with the public interest at heart.

The situation is so dire that the Irish Nurses Organisation complains that the lack of midwives in maternity hospitals is “putting mothers and their babies at risk”. Simply put, the problem is out of control because our spiralling birth figures have not been matched by a pro rata increase in resources. As a result, the quality of service available to pregnant women has suffered greatly.

The situation in Limerick is all the more worrying as the region has only one maternity hospital. In Dr Burke’s view, things are so bad that unless consultant numbers are increased, the hospital may be forced to either cap deliveries or go on strike.

The situation there is as bad as in Holles Street. Instead of the recommended safety ratio of one consultant to every 500 births, Limerick has one to every 750 babies. There are six consultants for every 4,500 births there compared to 11 consultants for around 8,500 births at Holles Street.

In addition to three extra consultants, according to Dr Burke, Limerick desperately needs more midwives and “a new building close to the main hospital, as it is frankly dangerous to be driving babies four miles for intensive care and access to expert consultants”.

Women have a right to demand that the Government addresses the serious shortcomings in the maternity service in a meaningful way.

Clearly, unless funding and staffing levels are significantly increased, the crisis will escalate with potentially disastrous consequences.

Long aware of the difficulties facing maternity hospitals, it is high time the Government put the safety of expectant mothers and their babies before political expediency.