Despite all efforts of those in the Keep the Horton General (KTHG) campaign, Banbury’s consultant-led service ended in 2016, to be replaced by a midwife-led maternity unit. There were poignant warnings of the dangers for mothers and babies in difficulty when the consultant-led maternity unit is up to an hour away at the John Radcliffe Hospital (JR) in Oxford (28 miles by motorway, 23.9 miles by the A4260), should complications require it; and Banbury mothers can be sent home up to 36 miles away from the JR prior to delivery when birth is not imminent and there is no bed available.
Following a CQC inspection of the midwife-led maternity service at the Horton General Hospital in January 2024, this dossier of adverse experiences was compiled by Beth Hopper and the KTHG campaign. This is an example of closures of local services not for better, safer care but because of refusal to train sufficient staff and fund services both local and regional. High volume (over 7300 births annually at the JR), centralised services can result in very poor if not frankly dangerous outcomes for patients – in this case mothers and babies, when there are insufficient maternity staff and beds.
Beth Hopper and Keep the Horton General Campaign write:
The Birth Trauma Dossier is a growing collection of accounts of childbirth in Oxfordshire following the 2016 downgrade of the Horton General Hospital’s obstetric (consultant-led) unit. We have 50 cases. The first 39 alone came from contributors known to one mother, Beth Hopper, who had a terrible set of experiences and feels deeply that full maternity must be returned to Banbury.
Each account, published in the Banbury Guardian, produces more awful descriptions of childbirth – something that should be as natural and peaceful as possible as couples welcome a new child to their family.
A range of accusations repeatedly include
- Mothers in labour being sent home – up to 36 miles – because they are not sufficiently far gone, in some cases narrowly avoiding disaster
- Mothers being sent home without pre- or post-birth checks, causing serious complications requiring operations
- Systematic neglect at the bedsides
- Midwives being unacceptably over-stretched, resulting in some becoming ‘rude’, ‘surly’ and lacking compassion
- Mothers being induced and then delayed – sometimes for days – because of the pressure of emergency workload, and being ‘allowed’ to deliver only when they are emergencies
- A reliance on induction to manage the throughput of expected births – many of these resulting in complications/forceps births resulting in injuries to babies and emergency Caesareans because the babies have not been ready.
- Medical management of births and subsequent procedures causing serious and ongoing physical damage to mothers
- The psychological impact on mothers in trauma, PTSD and post-partum depression
- The impact on partners, family, siblings and mothers themselves, being so far from home and community with all the issues around distance, cost and parking
- All but impossibility of mothers getting to the JR by public transport (one women did this after her waters had broken)
- All believe their experience would have been a lot better and dangers avoided if they had been able to give birth locally, at the Horton General Hospital.
It would be easy to simply accuse the Oxford maternity team. The truth is that the John Radcliffe is ‘managing’ births to match the appalling restraints they are under.
It is a production line when, at busy times, they are lining women up in labour and keeping them at the same stage until they become emergencies and are prioritised to the front of the queue
They have far too many births, too few midwives and maternity staff, and not enough space. Women are being ‘held’ in rooms without windows, daylight or fresh air, and even rooms used to store plumbing paraphernalia.
Far too many deliveries are proving unnecessarily distressing and downright dangerous. It is not how childbirth should be. Mothers who have invested in learning about natural childbirth are being cruelly denied any chance of that with no sympathy whatsoever.
Many of our accounts are borderline compensation cases and we are having the dossier scrutinised by specialist barristers.
Warnings were given at the time, not just by the Keep the Horton General Campaign, but by doctors and midwives, that the John Radcliffe Hospital was not going to cope with the extra 1700+ births annually (then) as well as their own workload. Since then the Banbury catchment (stretching into south Warwickshire and south Northants) has grown exponentially and the numbers will be far higher. This at the same time as the JR has found it difficult to recruit and retain midwives and special care baby nurses – something the Horton never had a problem with.
A published dossier shows that mothers are being taken to the brink of disaster in the JR maternity unit, and the Oxford University Hospitals trust (OUH) is laying itself open to legal proceedings. We do not aim to point blame at any single person, but at a system that has insisted on taking decisions that have resulted in a scandalously deteriorated and unacceptable service. This has to change.
The biggest thing to come out of this is that there are too many births, not enough midwives or facilities and NOT ENOUGH TIME. Labouring expectant mothers are being denied dignity and respect. They are being castigated for wasting people’s time. They are not receiving water or food; some are not being offered washing facilities if their waters have broken. Vulnerable mothers are being treated as second class citizens. Women being treated as though they are panicking unnecessarily – and as ignorant, because they may be first time Mums.
Many have described feeling humiliated, being left with waters leaking or bleeding in public – there is no privacy in this overcrowded department.
One of the biggest takeaways from all of this is that mothers are not being allowed into the JR maternity unit unless they are an emergency or about to deliver. They are not allowed or encouraged to have a relaxed labour in a place of safety, with their partners and ongoing midwife attention – because the JR cannot cope with the number of births they are obliged to accept. There is clear evidence of indefensible systematic negligence. Patient choice has been completely abandoned.
These stories prove how the promises of safe, better childbirth at the JR, since 2016 when Banbury’s consultant-led service ended, were false. The reality has resulted in some indescribable experiences for mothers who have been terrified, traumatised and in many cases left with PTSD.
The dossier indicates young, newly qualified midwives are still determined to give a good service. But some others appear pressured and jaded, and are presiding over inhumane treatment. The 50 appalling dossier cases are the tip of a huge iceberg.
Keep the Horton General believes a serious discussion must take place with a view to ensuring redevelopment of the Horton General includes, as promised, space for a return of obstetrics and SCBU with gynaecology. Then Banbury can again share the workload with the JR and offer decent, humane childbirth opportunities to the women of our catchments. We are assured that a team of midwives would immediately return to a reopened Banbury obstetric centre.
Beth Hopper and Keep the Horton General Canpaign
See also Restore the People’s NHS Maternity Factsheet
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