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In an opinion piece in The Times on Saturday there was an article entitled ‘Stemming Still Birth’.  The statistics quoted in this are awful, stating the rate of still births in the UK are higher than many other parts of Europe. The main thrust of the article was to suggest that women in labour are being thoroughly let down by the services in the UK.

Firstly though before I go on let’s all be clear that to be a parent of a child who dies prior or during birth would I’m sure be one of the worst and most harrowing experiences possible to undergo.

I am blessed enough to have three healthy children and to not have experienced this but it must be one of the most awful things.

The solution though first comes from a point where we must ensure the statistics are correct.

It is suggested in the article that healthcare professionals may have some form of perverse incentive to suggest that there are ‘no signs of life’ when a child is born because a current state of play in the UK is that there is no inquest into still births. The further suggestion in the article is that healthcare professionals will protect themselves when whisking a baby away and claiming that there were no signs of life to ensure that they’re not investigated for mistakes that they may have made during labour.

This is not a blog about still births or solutions to problems in labour, this is a blog about how far we persecute our healthcare professionals for being human beings. How much we expect them to be super human, free from any sort of human error, mistake or incentive to protect themselves, their livelihoods and their families.

I do not doubt that healthcare can move a long way to embracing lessons that can be learned from mistakes and failure and also ensuring that it ‘roots out’ the very worst of people who still exist (in very small numbers) within the professions.

This of course will never ever happen as long as the public, and particularly the newspapers and press are so quick to criticise and crucify the very people who overwhelmingly sacrifice themselves, their lives and their families all for the benefit of others.

In the last 10 years NHS dentists wages have dropped by 35% (they were too high in the first place let’s be clear) but how long can you sustain this type of drip drip drip. Relatively it’s as bad for doctors, it’s worse for nurses and it’s absolutely terrible for the support staff in the NHS.

Criticise as much as you like and vilify as hard as you want, but what will you do in the end when you turn around sick and there is no one there (and do not think for a minute it isn’t happening already). 

Blog post number: 1446