A community midwife tells of the impossible workload of a typical shift in nowadays’s overstretched,understaffed NHSThe autumn months are the busiest of the year for a midwife in the NHS. Christmas and current year excesses result in a predictable spike in the birth rate around September and the numbers only originate to settle as December approaches. nowadays I originate my late autumn shift as a community midwife earlier than usual to sort out the day’s clinics and visits. I start at the hospital, looking through the paperwork of those women who acquire been discharged in the last 24 hours. Two midwives from my team acquire phoned in sick and another is on leave. We acquire six half-day clinics and 29 home visits to newly postnatal mums to cover between the two remaining midwives. Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com