The former head of midwifery at Huddersfield Royal Infirmary says she fears Huddersfield Birth Centre is “doomed”.

Dr Helen Shallow, who led the opening of the midwife led birthing centre in 2008, has spoken out after the infirmary temporarily closed its unit for mums-to-be for the second time in three months.

Dr Shallow, a consultant midwife who has gained a PhD since leaving Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust in 2014, has lashed out at hospital bosses’ decisions to use the six bed unit as overspill when pressure mounts on beds in the main infirmary.

She undertook her PhD to explore the interactions between mothers and midwives when labour begins because she was concerned about the number of women who either arrived vary late in labour at the Trust's maternity services or who gave birth unexpectedly at home after being told by midwives that they could or should stay at home for longer.

Huddersfield Royal Infirmary Birth Centre

During the winter crisis in early January recovering cancer patients were moved in and pregnant mums told they had to give birth in Halifax or at home.

Last week it was again re-purposed for several days due to a high number of seriously ill patients needing treatment.

She has said the treatment of mums-to-be is undermining the birth centre and fears its days are numbered.

“To use the beds crisis as a reason for closing the birthing centre seems utterly ridiculous,” she said.

“I don’t buy this bed shortage crisis because how appropriate is it for other patients to be using rooms with birthing pools? I find it hard to believe that is the solution.”

She added: “If they keep closing it over and over again, it is doomed.

“If you don’t protect the integrity of it mums will vote with their feet and they won’t go there.

“Why would you elect to give birth there if you’re not confident it will be open when you need it.

“They’re incrementally dismantling the structure that’s in place. It seems like the rights and needs of women have gone down the pecking order.

“To blame winter pressures and bed shortages is to say to Huddersfield women that their needs for a safe place to birth their babies no longer matters and does not take priority.

“This is inexcusable.”

Huddersfield MP, Barry Sheerman cuts the ribbon to open the Little Footprints Suite bereavement room within the labour ward of the Calderdale Hospital with Rachael Branns (COR) Chair of bereavement charity, Sands, Midwives, Sarah Hall and Sara Balmforth, Head of Midwifery, Anne Marie Henshaw and parent and Sands member, Jo Grace.
Head of Midwifery, Anne Marie Henshaw (second from the right) with (left to right) Huddersfield MP, Barry Sheerman, Rachael Branns (COR) Chair of bereavement charity, midwives Sarah Hall and Sara Balmforth, and parent Jo Grace.

Anne-Marie Henshaw, Head of Midwifery at the trust, said: “Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust is justifiably proud of both of its Birth Centres and the midwives who work in them.

“The trust continues to offer midwife-led home birth or birth centre birth and consultant-led birth on our labour ward.

“The unprecedented pressures the NHS has faced this winter have meant that difficult decisions have had to be made to ensure the safety of the whole population we serve.

“We needed to use the birth centre beds for high numbers of very poorly patients and, for a time, we asked women to use the birth centre at Calderdale Royal Hospital instead.

“We reopened the birth centre as soon as we could and there are no plans to close it.”

Calderdale Royal Hospital, Halifax

Huddersfield Birth Centre – which is staffed by only midwives without any consultant doctor on the premises – had a controversial beginning as it was launched amid the move of full labour ward facilities out of Huddersfield.

At the time a protest was held with people marching through town to demand it was retained.

Dr Shallow, who worked for the National Midwifery Council, said the birth centre initially flourished. They anticipated 300 births in the first year after opening but reached 500.

But she claimed hospital bosses began to compromise the integrity of the birth centre after just a few years as staff shortages began to bite.

She said: “Incrementally the birth centre team began to feel stretched and pulled in too many directions.

“Midwives were pulled to the labour ward at Calderdale on a regular basis, leaving one midwife on the birth centre feeling vulnerable.

“This was not the deal we had made with Huddersfield mothers.

“The excellent birth centre manager left in 2012 after feeling that she could no longer do her job effectively.

“It is not good enough to say mothers can go to Calderdale.

“The birth centre there is already a very busy and well used midwifery-led facility.”