Midwives from London and the South East were honored at the inaugural London Maternity and Midwifery Festival Awards last week.
The Maternity and Midwifery Forum Awards took place at Earls Court on Tuesday 13th February, with the big winners on the day including Paulina Ewa Sporek of Croydon University Hospital; Indigo Midwifery Team of Lewisham & Greenwich NHS Foundation Trust; Sinead Farrell of Whittington Health ICO; Amy Robson, Lewisham & Greenwich NHS Foundation and Team Maia from Medway NHS Foundation Trust.
The awards were presented by Conference chair and Midwifery Consultant, Sue Macdonald alongside keynote speaker Claire Mathews, Deputy Head of Maternity Services, NHS England.
Discussing the awards Sue said “This was a great opportunity to recognise talented and highly committed individuals who are practising within London and the South East. We were thrilled with the quality and number of submissions, which made the judges’ assessment and final choices so difficult. We were so pleased to recognise these award winners, and several highly commended entries, and celebrate all that is best in midwifery and the maternity services in 2018.”
Indigo Midwifery Team from Lewisham & Greenwich NHS Foundation Trust took the Midwifery Team Award for “providing multi-disciplinary and multi-agency care for vulnerable women, focusing on those with moderate to severe mental health diagnosis, domestic violence, learning disabilities and those 19 and younger.”
Highly commended in this category were Project Joey, led by Jo Hillcoat-Wilding and team, Ashford & St Peter’s NHS Foundation Trust and Yolande Trabelsi, Home Birth Lead, Barking, Havering and Redbridge NHS Foundation Trust.
Sinead Farrell from the Whittington Health NHS Trust took the Maternity Management Award for “providing multi-disciplinary and multi-agency care for vulnerable women, focusing on those with moderate to severe mental health diagnosis, domestic violence, learning disabilities and those 19 and younger.”
Highly commended in this category were Trude McLaren, Senior Sister, The Birth Place, Medway NHS Foundation Trust and Sara Fitzsimmons MBE, Executive Charity Director, SiMBA.
Paulina Ewa Sporek, a midwife from Croydon University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust was awarded the Midwifery Achievement Award for her “dedicated work in setting up a nationally recognised initiative to improve maternity services for deaf parents.”
Speaking of her award winning work Paulina said “There’s difficulties when you’re working with deaf parents. The hardest thing is the lack of information and their lack of control when there’s an emergency. It’s frightening for everybody but without the means of communicating what’s happening it’s terrifying. That’s why communication in antenatal care is so crucial. We are listening to the experiences of deaf parents to improve information services for them so we have a better information structure when it comes to future experiences.”
Highly commended in this category were Lindsey Rose, Senior Lecturer in Midwifery, Anglia Ruskin University Cambridge and Vivienne Novis, Project Manager, OASI Care Bundle QI Project, RCOG.
Meanwhile, Midwives Lyndsay Walker and Sonya Hinchey known as ‘Team Maia’, were awarded the Innovation Award and praised by judges for recognising “the need for and the implementation of a dedicated induction of labour team to provide bespoke care and drive forward positive change.”
After claiming the prize, Lyndsay said “It is a massive shock, but we are so happy to win the award because we put our heart and soul into our work and we love it. We are really proud and it means so much to us to be recognised – it feels incredible.’’
Highly commended in this category were Rebecca Tranter, Social Media Midwife, Basildon and Thurrock University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and, once again, Yolande Trabelsi, Home Birth Lead, Barking, Havering and Redbridge NHS Foundation Trust.
Student Midwife, Amy Robson from the Lewisham and Greenwich NHS Trust who judges deemed to have “grown in confidence during her studies but always puts patients at the heart of care” was awarded the Student Midwife Award of the Year.
Highly commended in this category was Beth Towsey, Student Midwife at Anglia Ruskin University.
Watch the awards ceremony here: