Southend and Basildon Hospitals given thousands to improve maternity services (From Southend Standard)

Southend and Basildon Hospitals given thousands to improve maternity services

10:10am Sunday 27th January 2013 in Echo News By Emma Thomas

THOUSANDS of pounds have been handed to south Essex hospitals to improve maternity services.

Basildon Hospital has been given £19,977 to upgrade the current Forget-Me-Not bereavement suite to provide a private, safe, comfortable environment for parents suffering loss.

Southend Hospital will get £88,420 to pay for a Maternity Triage Service. This will give women support to make appropriate and safe choices for the birth of their baby by providing somewhere that a senior midwife can review and discuss care options as well as moving the early pregnancy unit to appropriate area.

The grants are part of a £25million cash pot from the Department of Health which will be shared between 100 hospitals.

The Forget-me-not group supports parents and families who have lost children.
One of the founders, Karla Cairns, 50, from Laindon, lost her daughter Grace-Ellen Cairns in 1992 at 23-and-a-half-weeks-old. She created a memorial garden at Pitsea Crematorium and the support group as well as the room at Basildon Hospital.

She said: “The hospital gave us what was a storage room originally, we set about fundraising and we opened it in 1995.

“It is in need of refurbishment and that money will be fantastic.”