Pregnant women offered budgets to choose the care they receive
- 24.02.2016
- HannahBottomley
- Clinical-negligence, Opinion, Clinical-negligence, Opinion
I was very interested to read about the proposal to introduce a personal care budget to pregnant women to enable them to choose their preferred maternity service. The proposal is one of a number of recommendations stemming from a report into maternity care commissioned following the foetal and maternal deaths at Barrow Infirmary.
One of the key issues for me, however, is not about the choice this will give to women, although that of course is important, but more about the safety. I understand that a personal budget enabling women to access continuity of care or have home births is considered to have positive benefits in terms of patient safety and, if this could be evidenced, then I would be all for it as anything to improve safety to both mothers and babies is something which to my mind should be implemented straight away.
The article on the BBC noted that the report also highlighted that the £560m is spent each year by the NHS on clinical negligence cases relating to maternity care. This is a huge figure and claims made in relation to maternity care top the value of clinical negligence claims across the health care sector year on year not due to the number of claims, but due to the severe, significant and life-long injuries which can be suffered by those babies who are injured at birth due to negligence.
A birth injury can result in a permanent and life-long disability which, if the negligence had not occurred, would otherwise have been avoided. Children who are brain injured in this way can often require significant levels of care for the rest of their lives along with specialist equipment and therapy input.
This life-long significant injury and need therefore accounts for why these claims are so expensive. A scheme which would therefore improve safety for mothers and babies during pregnancy and birth would therefore not only benefit those using it by hopefully limiting such tragic injuries but also save the NHS millions every day in relation to compensation. Surely a win-win solution if it can be implemented safely.