Association response to the 'Ockenden Review'
Friday 1 April 2022
The Association of Anaesthetists welcomes the Independent Review of Maternity Services at Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust (the 'Ockenden Review').
The Review describes a shocking and tragic series of maternal and neonatal deaths and severe injury. We would like to offer our condolences to all those affected. The NHS can and should do so much better in preventing these failings and to investigate them when they do, sadly, occur. The NHS failed you and your families.
As an organisation which represents members providing anaesthetic care, including to pregnant women, we have championed high-quality, safe practice for many years. We recognise that these incidents were caused by complex interactions of failings by individuals, structures, and processes. The remedies must also be multifaceted, and the opportunity raised by the publication of this report must be used to look at the whole system – locally in the Trust and across the NHS.
We pass on our heartfelt thanks to those who have fought to highlight these tragedies. We hope we, and others, can work with them to ensure that all the UK’s health services and their staff learn from these events and prevent this happening again.