Miscarriage Care and Facilities in Scotland: Scoping Report NHS Western Isles

This report details the findings of a scoping exercise to better understand miscarriage care in Scotland within this Health Board. The individual Health Board reports and the national report seek to aid policy makers and Health Boards in making decisions about improvements to Miscarriage Care


Findings

Miscarriage care services in Scotland

In Scotland women experiencing miscarriage present at many different locations. This includes GP practices, Accident and Emergency (A&E) departments, Maternity Units, Community Maternity units (CMU)[5], Early Pregnancy Units (EPU), and midwifery services more generally. Women can call in advance or present in person for the first time at this range of settings.

Within the 14 Health Board areas in Scotland, numerous secondary care sites that could provide miscarriage care in Scotland were identified. These were checked by the lead professional for miscarriage care in each Health Board to ensure they were secondary care sites that may be the first point of contact for women experiencing miscarriage. This resulted in 44 sites being identified. The sites are listed in Annex A. Table 1 shows the number of sites identified for each Health Board.

Table 1: Number of sites where women experiencing miscarriage in Scotland may be seen

Health Board

Number of sites

NHS Ayrshire and Arran

3

NHS Borders

1

NHS Dumfries and Galloway

2

NHS Fife

1

NHS Forth Valley

1

NHS Grampian

6

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde

5

NHS Highland

12

NHS Lanarkshire

3

NHS Lothian

2

NHS Orkney

1

NHS Shetland

1

NHS Tayside

3

NHS Western Isles

3

Total

44

Table 2 below lists the secondary care services that the 44 sites, that took part in this scoping exercise, said were available at each site within the 14 Health Board areas.

Table 2: Services for miscarriage care in Scotland

Services

Early Pregnancy Unit

Maternity Unit

Community Maternity Unit

Obstetrics and Gynaecology Department

Accident & Emergency Department

Recurrent miscarriage services

Infertility services

Total All Sites

17

19

21

21

37

13

14

All Health Boards

10

14

7

14

14

11

12

NHS Ayrshire and Arran

1

1

1

1

3

1

1

NHS Borders

1

1

0

1

1

1

1

NHS Dumfries and Galloway

0

1

0

1

2

1

2

NHS Fife

1

1

0

1

1

1

1

NHS Forth Valley

1

1

1

1

1

0

1

NHS Grampian

2

2

3

2

4

1

1

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde

5

4

4

4

4

2

2

NHS Highland

1

1

8

1

10

1

0

NHS Lanarkshire

2

1

0

2

3

1

1

NHS Lothian

2

2

0

2

2

2

1

NHS Orkney

0

1

0

1

1

1

1

NHS Shetland

0

1

0

1

1

0

1

NHS Tayside

1

1

3

2

1

1

1

NHS Western Isles

0

1

1

1

3

0

0

Services in NHS Western Isles

In NHS Western Isles three secondary care sites were identified that could come into contact with women experiencing miscarriage, these are:

  • Western Isles Hospital
  • Uist and Barra Hospital
  • Barra Community Hospital

Where most women present for the first time when experiencing a miscarriage differs depending on the site, these include: GP practice, Community Maternity Unit (at Uist and Barra Hospital) or Maternity services (at Western Isles Hospital). However, all sites noted that women would be transferred to the Maternity Unit at Western Isles Hospital if an intervention was required. The services provided at the three sites are detailed in Table 3 below.

Table 3: Services for miscarriage care in NHS Western isles

Services

Early Pregnancy Unit

Maternity Unit

Community Maternity Unit

Obstetrics and Gynaecology Department

Accident & Emergency Department

Recurrent miscarriage services

Infertility services

Western Isles Hospital

No

Yes

No

Yes

Yes

No

No

Uist and Barra Hospital

No

No

Yes

No

Yes

No

No

Barra Community Hospital

No

No

No

No

Yes

No

No

Contact

Email: socialresearch@gov.scot

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