Maternity Voices Partnership · pools. She has jumped at the idea and has already actioned for one to be made.” Melissa Dalby, Lay Co-chair, Hull Maternity Voices Partnership “We

What we are doing

Dedicated to improving the overall health and wellbeing of people living in Humber, Coast and Vale.

Humber, Coast and Vale Health and Care Partnership

We want to ensure that we design our maternity services around the needs of our populations by providing opportunities for the local community to share their experiences and ideas across Humber, Coast and Vale.

Our ambition

Maternity Voices Partnership

We’ve developed Maternity Voices Partnerships across Humber, Coast and Vale so that women and their families can contribute to the development of local maternity care.

A Maternity Voices Partnership is local parents working together with people who provide and fund maternity services to improve these services. Due to the Humber, Coast and Vale area being so vast, we have five Maternity Voices Partnerships covering different hospital maternity services across the region. The Partnerships come together collaboratively as the Maternity Voices Partnership Group.

The Maternity Voices Partnerships meet regularly, carry out consultation and feedback work, as well as representing women and their families at key meetings about service development and changes. The Partnerships cover topics such as: safety, communication, mental health, birth options, as well as highlighting gaps in services.

Some of the achievements of the North and North East Lincolnshire Maternity Voices Partnership include:

New bereavement midwife – through engagement events, a gap in the service for bereaved parents was highlighted. The Partnership helped secure funding for a bereavement midwife and had a representative on the interview panel.

Group B Strep awareness – raising awareness about the dangers of Group B Strep following feedback from women. All women across North Lincolnshire and North East Lincolnshire now receive a leaflet about this at their booking appointment.

Perinatal mental health support – a survey of postnatal women was used as evidence to help secure funding for specialist services; follow-up drop-in sessions with women and the perinatal mental health midwife enable ongoing co-production of this service.

Making a difference

“I find it such a positive and rewarding role to be helping improve maternity services in the region for women and their babies.

”When I started out in this role there was only one Maternity Voices Partnership across Humber, Coast and Vale – now we have five.

“Watching feedback from women turn into visible improvements in maternity services is fantastic. From home births to neonatal care, mental health to safety, we are constantly reviewing different areas of maternity care, listening to women and their families, and finding out what works best and what we can improve.”

“Watching feedback from women turn into visible improvements in maternity services is fantastic.”

Ruth Prentice, Lay Chair, North and North East Lincolnshire Maternity Voices Partnership; and Lay Chair, Humber Coast and Vale Maternity Voices Partnership Group

“I really enjoy being part of my local Maternity Voices Partnership. I try and attend as many of the local meetings and events as I can and I also help with the consultation and feedback work. It is important to me that the voices of women and their families are central to maternity services through consultation, policy and change.”

Hannah Miles, Maternity Voices Partnership volunteer service user representative

A partnership of NHS, local councils, health and care providers and voluntary and community organisations.

March 2020

Humber, Coast and Vale Health and Care Partnership

www.humbercoastandvale.org.uk

@HCVPartnership

“I really enjoy being part of my local Maternity Voices Partnership.”

“I strive to get peoples' voices heard, sometimes it's just the smallest adjustments that need to be made but they can make such a big difference. Not just by gathering negative feedback, but also hearing what is working well.

“I recently saw a hospital pull-up banner promoting water births. I sent a photo of it to our local Head of Midwifery suggesting we could do the same at our local hospital as our water birth rate is very low, even though we have three pools. She has jumped at the idea and has already actioned for one to be made.”

Melissa Dalby, Lay Co-chair, Hull Maternity Voices Partnership

“We need all of our communities to help raise awareness.”