The Care Quality Commission
  • Hospital
  • NHS hospital

St Mary's Birth Centre

Overall: Good read more about inspection ratings

Leicestershire County and Rutland PCT, Thorpe Road, Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire, LE13 1SJ 0300 303 1573

Provided and run by:
University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust

All Inspections

02 March 2023

During an inspection looking at part of the service

Pages 1 and 2 of this report relate to the hospital and the ratings of that location, from page 3 the ratings and information relate to maternity services based at Saint Mary’s Birth Centre.

We inspected the maternity service at Saint Mary’s Birth Centre, as part of our national maternity inspection programme. The programme aims to give an up-to-date view of hospital maternity care across the country and help us understand what is working well to support learning and improvement at a local and national level.

We will publish a report of our overall findings when we have completed the national inspection programme.

We carried out an announced focused inspection of the maternity service, following 48 hours’ notice. We only looked at the safe and well-led key questions.

We also inspected maternity at Leicester General Hospital and Leicester Royal Infirmary, run by University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust. Our reports are here.

Leicester General Hospital – https://www.cqc.org.uk/location/RWEAK

Leicester Royal Infirmary - https://www.cqc.org.uk/location/RWEAA

How we carried out the inspection

Maternity services at St Mary’s Birth Centre include antenatal, intrapartum (care during labour and birth), and postnatal care. Services were provided in a dedicated centre on the premises of the Melton hospital site in Melton Mowbray. The trust rented the building from a private landlord. The midwifery-led unit provided intrapartum care for women and birthing people who met the criteria and were assessed to have low risk pregnancies.

The birth centre (BC) had 2 birthing rooms which both included a pool for labour/birth, and ensuite facilities. The BC also had an 8- bedded postnatal ward where staff provided extended postnatal care to women and birthing people, regardless of whether their babies had been born there. This was of particular benefit to women and birthing people with complex needs or those who needed additional support with breastfeeding.

One hundred and thirty-seven women and birthing people had been cared for in labour in the calendar year 2022.There were 95 births, and 42 were transferred to the main unit(s). This equated to a transfer rate of 30.7%.

You can find further information about how we carry out our inspections on our website: https://www.cqc.org.uk/what-we-do/how-we-do-our-job/what-we-do-inspection.

13-16 January 2014

During a routine inspection

St Mary’s Birth Centre is part of the University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust, a teaching trust that was formed in April 2000 through the merger of Glenfield Hospital with Leicester General Hospital and Leicester Royal Infirmary. The trust provides care to the people of Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland as well as the surrounding counties.

St Mary’s Birth Centre, is a midwife-led unit based at St Mary’s Hospital in Melton Mowbray providing care for pregnant women and their families before, during and after birth. The centre risk-assesses women to ensure that its services meet their inclusion criteria. Home births are attended by the community midwifery teams. Community midwives also support the birth centre staff during busy times, particularly during the night.

We found that the service was safe, effective and caring while being responsive to the needs of its local population. In general, the midwives felt supported and involved in the management of the department. National guidance was taken in to account when designing policies and procedures that govern treatment, and all midwives knew about these policies and procedures.

The building is old and requires some maintenance in order for the environment to be easily cleaned. However, in general the service was clean. Women reported a good experience of using the service and felt involved in their care.

There are sufficient midwives to provide the service and a number of specialist midwives to support women in the community with specific issues. The location has low rates of infection and mortality as it does not undertake high-risk procedures. Staff were able to personalise the service to meet the needs of the women at the centre of their care.