The parents of a girl who died within minutes of being born have called for an independent investigation after the same NHS trust was fined £1.6 million following the death of three other babies.
Nottingham University Hospitals (NUH) Trust was fined at Nottingham Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday after pleading guilty to six counts of failing to provide safe care and treatment in relation to the deaths of Adele O’Sullivan, Kahlani Rawson and Quinn Parker in 2021.
The trust became the first to be prosecuted more than once by healthcare watchdog the Care Quality Commission (CQC) more than once after it was fined £800,000 in 2023 for failures in the care of Wynter Andrews.
Wynter died 23 minutes after being born at the Queen’s Medical Centre in Nottingham in September 2019.
NUH is at the centre of the largest maternity inquiry in the history of the NHS and Wynter’s parents, Sarah and Gary, want the Department of Health and Social Care to involve healthcare regulators in carrying out an independent, external investigation.
“The time for empty promises is over,” they told the BBC. “The time to listen and learn is now.”
Mr Andrews said the trust had failed to listen to warnings about staffing issues in the maternity unit.
“We watched the proceedings of (Wednesday’s) prosecutions from the public gallery as concerned parents – who were promised several years ago that our daughter’s death would bring about change.
“It is apparent that those entrusted to bring about change failed to do so.”
Adele O’Sullivan was 26 minutes old when she died on April 7 2021, Kahlani Rawson died aged four days old on June 15 2021, and Quinn Parker was one day old when he died on July 16 2021.
The court was told “serious and systemic failures” exposed all three mothers, Daniela O’Sullivan, Ellise Rawson and Emmie Studencki, and their babies to a significant risk of harm.
District Judge Grace Leong told the hearing, which was attended by NUH trust’s chief executive since September 2022 Anthony May, that the “catalogue of failures” in the trust’s maternity unit were “avoidable and should never have happened”.
District Judge Leong highlighted “critical failures” in care as she said the purpose of the sentencing hearing, in which she was limited to imposing a fine, was to “ensure the trust responsible is held to account and meaningful steps are taken to prevent such failures in the care of mothers and their babies, while recognising the harm caused”.
The £1.6 million fine was broken down into £700,000 for the death of Quinn Parker, £300,000 each for the deaths of Adele O’Sullivan and Kahlani Rawson and £100,000 each for the mothers.
The trust was also ordered to pay prosecution costs of more than £67,000 as well as a surcharge of £190.
In a statement released after the hearing, NUH chief executive Anthony May said: “The mothers and families of these babies have had to endure things that no family should after the care provided by our hospitals failed them, and for that I am truly sorry.
“We fully accept the findings in court today and have already implemented changes to help prevent incidences like this from this happening again.”
