Furness General Hospital

Ratings - Maternity

• Overall

  Good

• Safe

  Good

• Effective

  Good

• Caring

  Good

• Responsive

  Good

• Well-led

  Good

Our view of the service

We inspected the maternity service at Furness General Hospital on 15, 16 and 17 of July 2025 to follow up concerns we identified during our last inspection which took place in April 2023 and to make sure the care and treatment women received had improved. At our last inspection we rated maternity services as Requires Improvement overall, Requires Improvement for Safe, Responsive and Well Led, and Good for Effective and Caring. At our last inspection we identified 5 breaches in regulations.

We carried out a comprehensive, unannounced inspection of the maternity service, looking at the safe, effective, caring, responsive and well led key questions. 

We also inspected 2 other maternity services run by University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust.

Furness General Hospital provided obstetric and midwifery-led services along with community midwifery care and worked closely with Royal Lancaster Infirmary and other local hospitals where women and babies with complex needs received their care. The service included, early pregnancy care, antenatal, intrapartum and postnatal care. The maternity unit included both midwifery led and obstetric consultant led deliveries and combined this with triage, antenatal and postnatal care. The maternity services at Furness were all located within the South Lakes Birth Centre. There were 14 rooms which were allocated on admission and women remained in that room for the entirety of their stay in most cases. Four rooms had birthing pools and all had en suite facilities. The service also had 2 dedicated operating theatres, a special care baby unit, a transitional care facility and a bereavement suite.  

In the year April 2023 to March 2024, there were a total of 1,108 births at Furness General Hospital and 2,665 across the trust.

We visited the antenatal clinic, antenatal day unit, delivery and ward areas and obstetric theatres. We spoke with women who used the service and staff, including midwives, doctors, consultants and senior managers. In addition to this, we also held focus groups with breastfeeding women. We observed care and treatment, inspected several patients’ care records in each area we visited, and reviewed the trust’s audits and performance.

We refer to women in this report, but we recognise that some transgender men, non-binary people and people with variations in sex characteristics (VSC) or who are intersex may also use services and experience some of the same issues.

People's experience of this service

We spoke with 15 parents and family members who attended maternity services during our inspection. Those we spoke with gave us overwhelmingly positive feedback about their experiences of the service. We also received positive feedback about the service directly to CQC via telephone calls and emails. People told us they experienced care that was kind and compassionate. Staff were always friendly, helpful and supportive and nothing was too much trouble.