'Cramped layouts' at maternity unit, says review

A hospital has been found to have "cramped layouts", "visibly stretched staff" and "busy wards" by a national review of maternity services in England.

The Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH) in King's Lynn, Norfolk, was one of 12 trusts examined in a review led by Baroness Valerie Amos.

The report said it was "important" for investigators to see the hospital's buildings after staff and families raised concerns about their impact on services.

Professor Lesley Dwyer, the group chief executive of Norfolk and Waveney Hospitals Group, apologised for the "distress described" in the report and said it recognised the emotional impact on women and babies.

The hospital said it has refurbished its maternity unit, including temporarily moving its delivery suite during safety work linked to reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (Raac).

The report said that some staff described the hospital's estate as "ageing" and "constrained", with concerns around water safety and infection control.

Families described services under pressure, with the report including: "Many spoke about being on busy wards, with cramped layouts, visibly stretched staff and long waits for assessment, monitoring or support."

It added that services were dealing with high demand, with staff "juggling multiple tasks or patients".

The report also pointed to increasing complexity in care. Figures from the trust showed caesarean rates rose at the hospital from 39.73% in February 2023 to 43.97% in February 2026, with induction rates also increasing over the same period.

The review also heard of the recruitment challenges the hospital faced, including a large cohort of staff retiring and difficulties attracting experienced midwives.

One staff member said: "King's Lynn is a very quiet town… so we did lose quite a lot of midwives… that have gone to bigger cities."

The report said new buildings alone would not be enough to improve the hospital's maternity services, adding they also needed "a workforce that is experienced and flexible enough to meet fluctuating demands".

Some parents said they did not feel listened to when it mattered most. One said: "We flagged all the way through that there are signs this baby is not breathing normally… but the stock answer every single time was that's normal."

Another parent said: "If they'd listened an hour earlier, it wouldn't have ended up as an emergency."

Dwyer said: "We are sorry for the distress described, particularly where concerns were not fully heard, communication was not clear, or support following difficult or traumatic experiences did not feel as strong as it should have been.

"We must do more to ensure that changes are experienced consistently in the care we provide.

"There is more for us to do, and we will rise to that challenge."

Maternity services at the hospital are currently rated "good" by the Care Quality Commission.

The government said it will act on the findings through a new national taskforce set up to drive improvements in maternity care.

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