Wollongong midwives say a high number of ongoing vacancies in the hospital's maternity service is leading to a decline in breastfeeding and the rise of interventions during birth.
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On Tuesday, midwives staged a rally outside the hospital to highlight the long-term staff shortages, increased workloads, and call on the government to put in place guaranteed staffing ratios within postnatal maternity wards.
According to the NSW Nurses and Midwives Association, the hospital's maternity service currently has 24 full-time equivalent midwifery vacancies, which they say is the highest staffing deficit in many years.
NSWNMA Wollongong Hospital Branch Vice President Emma Gedge said midwives would "bust their guts" to ensure women had the best care possible, but that evidence showed ongoing staffing problems were leading to changes in outcomes for pregnant women and their babies.
"We will do everything we can to make sure women feel supported and safe in our care, at the detriment to ourselves," she said.
"But it starts with women having a lack of choice about their care - a lot may want to go through the midwives clinic through the antenatal clinic but we don't have enough midwives to run those clinics anymore so women are being shunted to GP shared care.
"They may also need to go home from the postnatal ward earlier than they want - and that can be a really good thing if they have really good support at home, but oftentimes they don't."
"Community midwives used to visit every single woman, no matter when she left our care, but now that's an ever shrinking criteria to get a home visit and it's just getting worse and worse."
She said statewide, the rates of breastfeeding were declining, due to the lack of one-on-one support needed to establish and support breastfeeding.
The state's latest Mother and Babies report shows that between 2016 and 2020, the percentage of women who were fully breastfeeding on discharge from the hospital declined from 74.9 per cent to 69.1 per cent.
The report also showed that the Illawarra Shoalhaven Local Health District had the highest rate of induced births in the state, with 40.2 per cent of women induced in the region in 2020.
"That comes from a lack of senior midwives now, who are able to speak up about the rights of women and advocate for giving women choices," Ms Gedge said.
"Women sometimes get through their whole pregnancy without actually seeing a midwife, they see their GP and then one of the junior residents at the hospital who says to them 'you need to have an induction at 39 weeks', and then women doesn't know how to speak up because she hasn't spoken to a midwife."
In a statewide campaign leading up to next year's election, NSWNMA midwives are seeking staffing ratios of at least one midwife to three women and their babies in postnatal wards.
"We can't care for women properly unless we have more midwives," Ms Gedge said.
Earlier this year, Wollongong midwives spoke about about having to look after up to 14 women and their babies on some of their shifts, saying there was barely time for meal and toilet breaks.
Then, Wollongong Hospital Maternity Operations Manager Barbara Atkins acknowledged it had been challenging to fill vacancies in the maternity service despite ongoing efforts.
"The District acknowledges that we do not currently have a full staff contingent in the Wollongong Maternity Service, but is committed to recruiting to vacant positions," she said.
"Illawarra Shoalhaven Local Health District (ISLHD) is committed to providing safe, effective and collaborative maternity care that addresses each woman's specific needs and achieves desirable health outcomes for both mother and baby," she said.
Midwives from Auburn in Western Sydney and Coffs Harbour on the Mid North Coast also participated in rallies on Tuesday to raise community awareness of the issues facing maternity services.
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Kate McIlwain
For more than a decade, I've helped the Illawarra Mercury set the news agenda across the region. Currently I'm the paper's health reporter - covering the stories of Illawarra workers and residents in the wake of a global pandemic and at a time where our health systems are stretched to the limit.
For more than a decade, I've helped the Illawarra Mercury set the news agenda across the region. Currently I'm the paper's health reporter - covering the stories of Illawarra workers and residents in the wake of a global pandemic and at a time where our health systems are stretched to the limit.
