Chief Nursing Officer for England, visits Musgrove Park Hospital

Earlier this month we were delighted to welcome Chief Nursing Officer for England, Dame Ruth May, to Musgrove Park Hospital to take a tour of our Somerset maternity and neonatal services and meet midwifery and nursing colleagues working there. During the visit, Ruth heard about some of the key improvements that have been made since the CQC inspection in November 2023.

Ruth met our own chief nurse, Hayley Peters, chair, Colin Drummond, director of redevelopment and new hospitals programme lead (NHP) Ian Boswall, director of midwifery, Sally Bryant, associate medical director for obstetrics, James Coulston and Maternity and Neonatal Voices Partnership (MNVP) chair Donna Butland.

As part of the visit, Ruth heard positive feedback from service users about their experiences of our maternity services through our MNVP and the clinical team described some of the improvements that have been made to care pathways, including the maternity triage service and elective surgery. The team also shared the proposed estates improvement plan for our current maternity and neonatal buildings as part of the national New Hospitals Programme.

During a tour of the facilities, Ruth also spoke to a number of colleagues from our maternity and neonatal services to hear about the challenges presented by the current condition of the maternity buildings and the interim improvements that have taken place to ensure that women and birthing people can continue to receive high quality care and have a positive birthing experience.

 Somerset FT chairman, Colin Drummond, said: “We were so pleased to welcome Ruth to Musgrove Park. Our maternity estate dates back to just after the second world war and is one of the oldest in the UK. It is not what our patients deserve and poses many challenges for our colleagues. It is vitally important that we are able to move forward our plans for a new maternity and paediatrics centre.

“We are very grateful to Ruth for taking the time to visit Somerset and to meet the teams who are working so incredibly hard to care for our service users.”

Dame Ruth said: “It was a pleasure to meet midwifery and nursing colleagues, and others from the maternity and neonatal services at Musgrove Park Hospital and hear about the trust’s work to improve services since the CQC inspection was carried out last year.

“One of the key themes in the NHS three year delivery plan for maternity and neonatal services is listening to, and working with, women and families. Maternity and Neonatal Voice Partnerships have such an important role in helping to ensure service user voices are at the heart of decision making and I was delighted to have the opportunity to meet members of the local MNVP and hear about their experiences.”