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Chelsea and Westminster Hospital’s Maternity Practice Development Team Commended at Health Education Awards

The Maternity Practice Development team at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust has been highly commended for ‘Best Example of Interprofessional learning’ at the Health Education England's North West London Awards 2016: Excellence in Education & Training (HEE NWL) for their Multidisciplinary Obstetric and Midwifery Simulation (MOMS) course.

Photo: Specialist Trainee in Obstetrics and Gynaecology Pippa Letchworth and Practice Development Midwife Jenny Evans with Recovery College Manager at Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust, Syena Skinner, who presented the award.

The Trust’s Maternity Practice Development team has been highly commended for ‘Best Example of Interprofessional learning’ at the Health Education England's North West London Awards 2016: Excellence in Education & Training (HEE NWL) for their Multidisciplinary Obstetric and Midwifery Simulation (MOMS) course. These awards aim to highlight the innovative and inspiring work which is taking place in North West London and celebrate both individuals and teams achieving excellence in education and training.

This innovative course is run over two days and involves a multidisciplinary team of midwives, nurses, qualified and trainee obstetricians and anaesthetists, and maternity support workers coming together to prepare for and learn about managing an emergency situation. The MOMS course is mandatory and has been running at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital every two weeks for the past six years, with between 200 and 300 members of staff completing the course each year.

Taking on a different theme each year, the MOMS course is adapted and re-designed to ensure continued professional development for all staff. The focus of this year’s course is mental health and compassionate care in Midwifery while last year looked at sepsis and indirect causes of maternal fatality.

In addition, the MOMS course has been adapted to create an antenatal clinic course with support from fetal medicine consultants and specialist screening midwives, as well as a homebirth course involving community midwives and the London Ambulance Service.

Pippa Nightingale (Director of Nursing at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust) said: “The MOMS course is excellent example of multidisciplinary simulation training which focuses on skills, communication and teamwork within a multidisciplinary team. Receiving this commendation is important because it recognises the valuable work that our Maternity Practice Development team does in providing hands-on training for our staff, which ensures the Trust can deliver the best possible care and expertise to its patients.”

The Trust is committed to delivering high quality care which is demonstrated by its continued development of the MOMs course, particularly its adaptation for international training. The Trust’s Maternity Practice Development team has successfully delivered the course in Uganda, Ethiopia and South Africa—running 31 international courses to over 351 medical professionals—reaching an estimated 10,000 maternity patients. 

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mkeats George Vasilopoulos