NMH

NMH | 2024 22 Governance A fter 20 years in my role as Director of Midwifery and Nursing, I am writing my final annual report. It's been my pleasure and privilege to lead my team and I could not function without their supportng me. I would like to pay tribute to all of my colleagues within the Hospital, my Midwifery and Nursing managers and staff and in particular my Assistant Directors of Midwifery and Nursing. Siobhan Flanagan my PA and Lisa Murray, Midwifery & Nursing HR Executive whom are the backbone of my office and I owe them a debt of gratitude. I have also been so fortunate to work with my Executive Management Team colleagues and friends, Prof Shane Higgins, Ronan Gavin and Alistair Holland and Clinical Director Dr Roger Mc Morrow whom have always supported me in my role. As I reflect on the last twenty years, I am immensely proud of our Midwifery and Nursing team. The range of services across maternity, neonatal care, women's health and gynaecology have increased exponentially. Many staff have established additional support services for women that facilitates the sharing of expertise and knowledge which enhances each woman's care experience in so many areas, from booking in to discharge with her new baby or when she engages with the gynaecology team. Each year in this Hospital, midwives and nurses have innovative ideas to improve the way care is planned and provided. Some of this was driven by national strategies such as the National Maternity Strategy 2016-2026. Investment from NWIHP following the publication of this document, which focused on many areas such as the expansion of the community midwifery services, investment in infrastructure, women's health services including publicly funded fertility treatment and menopause services or the national neonatal transport service. Director of Midwifery & Nursing Service Developments often arise from innovative leaders who look at ways that services for women can be improved. There are so many examples of this local innovation: the establishment of the dedicated Emergency Room, expanding the Labour and Birthing Unit, including a birthing pool, or the development of a new clinic such as the IRIS clinic for hyperemesis, the Labour Hopscotch to improve active labour for women, the introduction of waterbirths, the affirmation cards to promote a positive approach to birthing and colostrum harvesting sets to promote breastfeeding. So many women have benefitted from the Birth Reflections service, the Poppy Clinic for postnatal morbidity or the Pre-assessment Clinic, Menopause Clinic and Fertility service. All of these ideas involve Senior Midwives or Nurses who took the initiative and established new clinics or services to meet a specific need for women and improve processes. Some challenges stand out for me over the last number of years in particular. The introduction of the Maternal Newborn Clinical Management System (MN-CMS) electronic health record (EHR) across the Hospital was a system wide change in 2018 that required years of planning and preparation. It was led internally by Dr Tina Murphy, RIP. Tina was an incredibly dedicated colleague and friend and we all miss her still. She established a strong team who have continued to embed the EHR and to improve the functionality and applicability of the data generated from the system. During the cyber-attack on the entire HSE in May 2021 which lasted 10 weeks, it was really evident to us how much we missed the EHR and the benefits of having the MN-CMS to manage patient's information. The Repeal the 8th Amendment was passed in May 2018 after a long campaign and the subsequent introduction of the Termination of Pregnancy service was very challenging for the Hospital in January 2019. Ann Calnan, Assistant Director of Midwifery & Nursing with Mary Brosnan, Director of Midwifery and Nursing. Ann received the Direcotr of Midwifery & Nursing medal to acknowledge her outstanding contribution to mid- wifery and to the National Maternity Hospital for almost 35 years.

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