HASLEMERE health region Surrey Heartlands has been selected by NHS England as one of seven sites to start implementing a national maternity transformation project.

Last week, Health Secretary and town MP Jeremy Hunt restated pledges to improve safety in maternity units, following the publication of a study by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists that examined 1,136 births nationwide in 2015 which ended in neonatal death, severe brain injury or stillbirth after a pregnancy came to term.

It found three in four newborns might have been saved if they had received the right care, with failure to monitor the baby’s heart rate identified as one of the most common errors.

Leading the NHS England push to improve services, Surrey Heartlands launched a ‘Better Births’ project on June 19, in Chobham, when delegates from maternity services, health, social care, universities and service users gave their views on how best to shape maternity services in Surrey.

Key speakers were Baroness Julia Cumberlege CBE, patron of the National Childbirth Trust and vice president of the Royal College of Midwifery, and Professor Jacqueline Dunkley-Bent OBE, head of maternity, children and young people for NHS England. Baroness Cumberlege has worked closely with the Better Births project and helped to set the recommendations to improve maternity care both for women and for staff.

Jacqui Tingle, head of midwifery at Royal Surrey County Hospital NHS Foundation Trust said: “As an early adopter, the Surrey Heartlands five-year sustainability transformation plan will work through solutions for developing maternity services and play a key role in delivering action and improvement quickly.

“We will pave the way for a national roll-out of initiatives to deliver safer, more personalised care for all women and every baby, improving outcomes and reducing inequalities.”