Furness General Hospital Maternity Statistics

University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust did not have the information requested.

Dear University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Trust,

On Friday 15th January 2010, the North West Evening Mail published a press statement from Tony Halsall, chief executive of the UHMBT, which included the following:

“Around 1,200 babies are delivered safe and well at Furness General Hospital every year. Latest statistics show that Furness General Hospital and the trust as a whole are among the safest places in England to have a baby.

“Our trust has fewer still births and neonatal deaths than the national average”

My FOI request is:

1) Please provide me details of the source of the information upon which this press statement was based. Including the data relating to Furness General Hospital and the “national average” figures used to make the comparison.

2) From 2002 onwards, please provide me with the following information:

a) The number of babies delivered in each year at Furness General Hospital.

b) The number of still births in total for each year at Furness General Hospital.

c) The number of neonatal deaths (occurring within 2 weeks of birth), for all babies born at Furness General Hospital for each year.

d) The number of maternal deaths at Furness General Hospital for each year.

e) The number of babies born suffering some degree of harm during birth at Furness General Hospital for each year (if there are differing categories of harm, please include the details).

f) The total number of patient complaints received regarding maternity service at FGH for each year.

g) The total number of SUI investigations initiated each year relating to maternity services at Furness General Hospital.

h) The total number of legal proceedings started against the trust, relating to maternity services at FGH for each year.

i) The total number of case, where legal actions against the trust, relating to maternity services at FGH, resulted in an admission of liability.

j) The total amount of compensation paid out, resulting from legal action relating to maternity services at Furness General Hospital for each year.

k) The comparable “national average” statistics for each of the above measures.

Yours faithfully,

James Titcombe

University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust

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[1]UHMBcolB

Trust Headquarters

Westmorland General Hospital

Tel: 01539 795366

Fax: 01539 795313

Reference Number: 559

21 January 2010

James Titcombe

[2][FOI #27420 email]

Dear James

RE: REQUEST FOR INFORMATION UNDER THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT (FOI Act)

I am writing to acknowledge receipt of your written request of 21 January
2010 regarding maternity services at Furness General Hospital. This was
received in this office on 21 January 2010 via our electronic mailing
system. The FOI Act provides for up to 20 working days to respond to
written requests from date of receipt. You can therefore expect to receive
a written response by 17 February 2010.

Your request is currently being processed. Should we require further
clarification of your information needs, we will contact you again within
the timeframe indicated above.

There are certain categories of information that are exempt from the
general right of access provided by the FOI Act. These include, for
example, personal information protected by the Data Protection Act 1998
and where the release of information would not be in the public interest
as defined by the Act. Should your request be deemed to relate to any
exempt information, you will be advised accordingly and a full explanation
given.

Public authorities may charge a fee for the information requested. The
fees are worked out in accordance with the regulations issued under the
Act. Should your request generate fee payment, you will be informed at
the earliest opportunity with an estimation of costs provided.

The officer handling your request can be contacted by telephone on 01539
716698 should you have any questions or concerns.

Yours sincerely

TONY HALSALL

CHIEF EXECUTIVE

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University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust

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Dear Mr Titcombe

Please find attached our response to your FOI request

Thank you.

Carol Webster
Freedom of Information

DISCLAIMER: This e-mail may be confidential and privileged. If you are not the intended recipient please accept our apologies; please do not disclose, copy or distribute information in this e-mail or take any action in reliance on its contents: to do so is strictly prohibited and may be unlawful. Please forward the message to [email address] before deleting it. Comments or opinions expressed in this email are those of their respective contributors only. The views expressed do not represent the views of the Trust, its management or employees.
University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Trust is not responsible and disclaims any and all liability for the content of comments written within. Thank you for your co-operation

Dear University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Trust,

The information you have provided regarding neonatal deaths of babies born at FGH are remarkably low, on average since 2002, almost half the national average.

In 2009 for example, according to the statistics provided, only 1 neonatal death of any baby born at FGH occurred. However, the following news article suggests that there were at least 2 neonatal deaths in 2009:

http://www.nwemail.co.uk/news/pair-build...

Please can you explain this apparent discrepancy?

Please can you also confirm that the figures provided are accurate and include all neonatal deaths, for any child born at FGH, regardless of the eventual place/hospital in which the child died?

In 2008 for example, that the figures include the death of my son, Joshua Titcombe and also the death of baby Chester Hendrickson, both of whom were born at FGH but died outside the trust as they were transferred to different hospitals

The figures provided are very reassuring, but it is clearly important that they are accurate and representative of the true situation. Therefore, clarification is required regarding the points above.

Yours faithfully,

James Titcombe

University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust

Trust Headquarters
Westmorland General Hospital

Tel: 01539 795366
Fax: 01539 795313
Reference Number: 603

25 March 2010

James Titcombe
[FOI #27420 email]

Dear James

RE: REQUEST FOR INFORMATION UNDER THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT (FOI
Act)

I am writing to acknowledge receipt of your written request of 25 March
2010 regarding maternity statistics at Furness General Hospital. This
was received in this office on 25 March 2010 via our electronic mailing
system. The FOI Act provides for up to 20 working days to respond to
written requests from date of receipt. You can therefore expect to
receive a written response by 23 April 2010.

Your request is currently being processed. Should we require further
clarification of your information needs, we will contact you again
within the timeframe indicated above.

There are certain categories of information that are exempt from the
general right of access provided by the FOI Act. These include, for
example, personal information protected by the Data Protection Act 1998
and where the release of information would not be in the public interest
as defined by the Act. Should your request be deemed to relate to any
exempt information, you will be advised accordingly and a full
explanation given.

Public authorities may charge a fee for the information requested. The
fees are worked out in accordance with the regulations issued under the
Act. Should your request generate fee payment, you will be informed at
the earliest opportunity with an estimation of costs provided.

The officer handling your request can be contacted by telephone on 01539
716698 should you have any questions or concerns.

Yours sincerely

TONY HALSALL
CHIEF EXECUTIVE

show quoted sections

University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust

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Dear Mr Titcombe,

Please find attached the response to FoI 603.

Kind regards,

Louise Fleming

DISCLAIMER: This e-mail may be confidential and privileged. If you are not the intended recipient please accept our apologies; please do not disclose, copy or distribute information in this e-mail or take any action in reliance on its contents: to do so is strictly prohibited and may be unlawful. Please forward the message to [email address] before deleting it. Comments or opinions expressed in this email are those of their respective contributors only. The views expressed do not represent the views of the Trust, its management or employees.
University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Trust is not responsible and disclaims any and all liability for the content of comments written within. Thank you for your co-operation

Dear University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Trust,

I am in complete shock by this response. What you are saying is that no matter how many babies who are born at FGH die, no matter if the cause of death was negligence on behalf of FGH, as long as you transfer them to another hospital before they die, you don’t count them as statistics. This explains why the neonatal death of babies born at FGH are so low, many congratulations on this Mr Dyer, what an achievement to be proud of.

Your response already highlights 4 neonatal deaths that you have not counted, how many more are there?

Can you now provide the true statistics, of ALL neonatal deaths of babies born at FGH, regardless of the hospital in which your trust transferred them to prior to their death?

I am outraged that Mr Halsall has used the neonatal death rates at FGH as a reassurance to the public regarding the safety of maternity services, when the statistics used don’t even include Joshua’s death. The figures you have previously provided are completely meaningless.

This also raises serious questions about why you transferred babies such as Joshua and Chester Hendrickson in the first place, was this because of medical necessity or because you wanted to preserve the extraordinarily low neonatal death rates which you as a trust are so proud?

I am completely disgusted with this situation, it cheapens the life of my son and discredits the value of the information provided..

Regards,
James

Yours faithfully,

James Titcombe

Dear University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Trust,

I do not believe that you have answered my original FOI request, so to clarify.

Please provide me with the total number of neonatal deaths of all babies born at FGH for the years 2002 – 2009. Please note that I am not asking for the total number of cases you have reported under the Child Death Overview Panel (CDOP) requirements. I am specifically asking for the total number of babies, who were born at FGH, that died before they were 28 days old, regardless of whether, as in the case of my son, they were transferred to a different hospital before they died.

If you are not able to provide this simple information, please let me know.

Yours faithfully,

James Titcombe

University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust

1 Attachment

Dear Mr Titcombe

Please see our response to your FOI request.

Many thanks

Carol Webster

DISCLAIMER: This e-mail may be confidential and privileged. If you are not the intended recipient please accept our apologies; please do not disclose, copy or distribute information in this e-mail or take any action in reliance on its contents: to do so is strictly prohibited and may be unlawful. Please forward the message to [email address] before deleting it. Comments or opinions expressed in this email are those of their respective contributors only. The views expressed do not represent the views of the Trust, its management or employees.
University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Trust is not responsible and disclaims any and all liability for the content of comments written within. Thank you for your co-operation

James Titcombe

Dear University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Trust,

Your response is an admission that you do not know how many babies born at Furness General Hospital die before they are 28 years old.

How can you be monitoring the relative safety of any of your trust’s maternity units if you don’t even know this basic information?

Your response acknowledges that FGH does not provide high dependency care for the most sick babies and that therefore, these babies are transferred. If you are not counting these babies in your neonatal death statistics, how can you infer anything useful from such figures?

In effect, you are operating blind to important information that you should be monitoring to look for patterns or trends that could lead to preventable deaths such as that of my son.

This situation can not be justified. This is a disgrace, both for your organisation and the bodies that are supposed to be regulating you

Yours faithfully,

James Titcombe

James Titcombe left an annotation ()

It is a sad fact that even now, nearing the start of 2013, I have still been unable to obtain true and accurate figures for how many babies born at Furness General Hospital (FGH) have died before they reach 28 days old. The maternity unit at FGH does not have a high dependency neonatal care unit and any baby born before 32 weeks is automatically transferred. Other babies (like my son) who are either born in a poorly condition or become poorly in the first days of life, in the vast majority of cases will also be transferred to units outside the trust. The trust claim that they do not 'routinely' follow up the outcome of babies transferred outside the trust and so are unable to provide accurate figures for the total number of neonatal deaths. This means that the true number of neonatal deaths for babies born at FGH could be significantly higher that expected, but the trust is still able to report lower than average figures because failed babies like my son are not counted in the published figures. Worse still, the trust has repeatedly referred to having lower than average neonatal death rates and has used this to make claims about the safety of the unit which were deeply misleading. All my attempts to obtain accurate information have failed - I can only assume that this is deliberate and because certan people 'in the know' don't want the full truth about the failures at FGH maternity unit to become public knowledge. We may never know the truth unless there is an independent inquiry.