- NHS hospital
James Paget Hospital
Report from 28 April 2025 assessment
Ratings - Maternity
Our view of the service
James Paget University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust provides maternity services at James Paget Hospital. From April 2023 to March 2024, there were 1715 babies born at James Paget Hospital.
We last inspected maternity services at James Paget Hospital in January 2023. This was a focused inspection looking at Safe and Well-led as part of the National Maternity Safety Inspection Programme. Maternity was rated inadequate overall.
We conducted this unannounced focused assessment on 16 September 2025 to follow-up on the 2023 inspection findings. As this was a focused assessment, we only looked at the safe and well led domains.
We visited the following areas as part of the assessment:
The postnatal and antenatal ward, triage and maternity assessment unit, obstetric theatre and recovery area, the birth centre and labour suite. We also looked at the bereavement facilities, and outpatient areas including antenatal consulting areas and pregnancy scanning areas.
We spoke with members of the maternity team including maternity support workers, junior doctors, registrars, consultant obstetricians and anaesthetists, band 5, 6 and 7 midwives, specialist midwives, the consultant midwife, matrons and the quadrumvirate.
Safe: We looked at maternity services only and rated safe as requires improvement. Staff did not manage inpatient paper records safely to ensure important information was correctly recorded or to prevent records falling apart. Not all staff undertook required training to safely treat and care for women. The facilities mostly met the needs of women, the service was taking action to address issues around the maternity triage. However, the service had a good learning culture. Managers investigated incidents thoroughly. Staff followed clear safeguarding pathways. There was enough equipment and this was safe to use. Staff followed infection control guidance. There were enough staff with the right qualifications and experience. Staff managed medicines well.
Well-led: We looked at maternity services only and rated well led as requires improvement. The culture within the service had improved since our last inspection, although there remained a small pocket of dissatisfaction. The service had improved but further work was needed in reporting of incidents externally. Leaders were visible and worked hard to foster collaboration with staff. There were systems in place for staff to raise concerns, although staff told us they did not always feel concerns were listened to. Risk was managed in a timely manner and maternity leaders worked collaboratively with partners. There was a culture of continuous improvement with staff given the time and resources to try new ideas.
People's experience of this service
People we spoke with during our assessment told us risks were explained by staff and they felt involved in decision making. They told us they knew who to contact if they needed to during their care journey. Comments included, “They have done everything I need. They have been great” from staff, who were “Amazing”, and, “Very helpful”.
Women knew who to contact if staff had organised other health professionals for them. Follow up arrangements were made wherever possible before staff left women.
People were able to raise concerns but said they had not needed to.
People could access care, treatment, and support when they needed it, including out of hours and in an emergency. Women, along with their families, were able to discuss possible treatment.
People said they did not experience discrimination or inequality. The service made reasonable adjustments for people with disabilities, those with communication difficulties or cognitive impairment.