Maternity and neonatal care - Best Start five-year plan 2017–2024: report
This report provides insight into the key actions and achievements that have been delivered during the lifetime of the Best Start.
Conclusion
The delivery of three quarters of the Best Start recommendations is a result of the combined work of the Best Start Programme Board and Subgroups, maternity and neonatal staff in Health Boards, NHS Education for Scotland, Public Health Scotland, the Scottish Perinatal Network, and the Scottish Government. As illustrated in this report, this has led to fundamental and long-lasting changes to the delivery of services and the ethos of the delivery of care.
This report marks the end of the Programme infrastructure which supported delivery of the ‘Best Start’. However, the work to implement the recommendations, including the core recommendations of continuity of carer and the new model of neonatal intensive care continues, and the Best Start model of care now moves to be embedded in maternity services as ‘business as usual’.
The context for delivery of maternity and neonatal services has changed over the last seven years and will continue to change. Safety of maternity and neonatal services remains a priority for action, and the recently announced Healthcare Improvement Scotland development of maternity standards and the introduction of Safe Delivery of Care inspections will focus the agenda for maternity and neonatal services moving forward.
Best Start was designed to improve maternity and neonatal care, with staff working together to put women, babies and families at the centre of care. The achievements that have been highlighted in the report have delivered on that ethos and the improvements that have been made have fundamentally changed maternity and neonatal services in Scotland.