Mum gives birth alone to stillborn

A HOSPITAL is reviewing its childbirth care after a mother delivered her stillborn baby alone in her own bathroom.

Jane Auden, who already knew her unborn baby had died, walked out of the University Hospital of North Staffordshire's recently-opened £40million maternity unit after being put in a room with happy mums and their healthy babies.

The 35-year-old was placed on the ward, because the hospital's two bereavement rooms were not available on January 21.

A bed was missing from one room, while a staff training session was taking place in the other.

And, after spending 40 minutes in tears in a small room waiting for someone to help her, she left the complex and delivered her daughter Lyra alone at her Chesterton home less than an hour later.

The hospital has now apologised to the supermarket manager and launched an investigation into what went wrong.

Ms Auden, who has two other children and is a manager at Morrisons, in Milehouse, said: "I was left alone by the hospital and what followed in my bathroom will never leave me.

"I can hardly stand to be in this house so we have decided to sell up. I've been diagnosed with depression and am I have to go out every night for walks to try and get my head straight.

"I had my other two children in the old maternity block. The new place might look modern and shiny, but they treated me like a number not a person.

"We eventually want another baby, but the last place I will go is that hospital; I will go to somewhere like Stafford or Leighton, in Crewe."

Ms Auden's partner Adrian Turner called paramedics minutes after the stillbirth at the house in London Road.

She was taken back to the same hospital holding Lyra before being admitted to one of the bereavement rooms which was unavailable earlier.

Lyra was taken from her and cleaned before being handed back to the couple to say goodbye. She was cremated at a funeral service on Friday.

The baby would have been the first child of Mr Turner, aged 29, who said: "We have been given no bereavement support from the hospital and been told the only group locally doing this work has had to close."

A hospital spokesman said: "Staff offer their condolences to Ms Auden and Mr Turner. Our early investigations into their concerns show our service on this occasion was not to the standards we normally provide.

"Although the vast majority of families have a positive experience, we need to review our care for people in situations similar to Ms Auden to ensure this does not happen in future."