Hospitals turn away pregnant women

London: Pregnant women are regularly being turned away from overcrowded London maternity wards, it emerged on Monday.

Figures reveal how hundreds of women face a traumatic birth in "cattle truck" conditions or struggle in under-staffed wards.

One hospital trust that is planning to axe beds was forced to shut its doors at least 91 times last year. Barnet and Chase Farm is losing one of its doctor-led maternity sites under a controversial overhaul of the NHS, yet is already struggling to cope.

Medical staff in Barking, Havering and Redbridge also had to divert women between hospitals in east London because of bed shortages.

The Chelsea and Westminster Trust was forced to close to new admissions at least five times last year. On one occasion wards were effectively shut for 48 hours as staff struggled with the workload.

Hillingdon Hospital's maternity unit was also closed once. The data raises new fears about the standard of maternity care in the wake of a damning Healthcare Commission report.

A spokeswoman for the National Childbirth Trust said: "It is absolutely terrifying for women to arrive at a maternity ward to find the doors are closed. Hospitals need to plan far more carefully because the birth rate in London is going up."

The closures in north London come as bosses plan to axe specialist maternity care at one of the sites.

Under a controversial review, doctor-led maternity services will be removed from the Enfield site and split between Barnet Hospital and the North Middlesex in Edmonton.

Geoff Martin of London Health Emergency said: "It would be grossly irresponsible to press on with plans for Chase Farm when the fact is that services are already severely overstretched. If the services are axed in Enfield it will create chaos across whole swathes of north London."

Averil Dongworth, chief executive of Barnet and Chase Farm Hospitals NHS Trust, defended the move.

She said: "We are always open to emergency admissions and at no point in the past year has the entire service been closed. The proposals will move inpatient maternity care from three to two sites."