Specialist Midwife Pelvic Health

Are you an experienced Midwife with a passion for improving services for women and their families accessing maternity services? Do you have a passionate for pelvic health and perineal care?

Wirral University Teaching Hospital (WUTH) are implementing a new service to enhance prevention of pelvic floor dysfunction and provide, timely, evidence based treatment for women in the perinatal period.

We are looking for an enthusiastic and motivated Midwife with significant clinical experience to provide leadership and service implementation within maternity services.

You will need to have experience of change management and successful service implementation and be confident and competent in perineal suturing and care.

Main duties of the job

You will work within the pathway for the Perinatal Pelvic Health Service, working closely with the Perinatal Pelvic Health Physiotherapist, Psychological Wellbeing Midwife, the Urogynaecology team, Colorectal team and Obstetric team.

The role will involve training and support for staff as well as support pelvic floor exercise training, assessment, personalised care planning and onwards referral for service users within the scope of a Midwife and with relevant training/qualifications. You will be expected support the project lead with service evaluation, gathering feedback, KPI's and audit.

All new colleagues can expect to receive a warm and friendly Wirral welcome from the very first time they make contact with us. We are described as "competent and caring staff" by our patients.

Wirral University Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust is situated on The Wirral peninsula which has a stunning coastline and beautiful countryside surroundings, with great activities for its residents.

We are one of the largest and busiest acute Trusts in the North West of England, comprising of the Wirral's only Emergency Department. We provide a high quality range of acute care services and employ over 6,000 staff, who serve a population of approximately 400,000 people across Wirral, Ellesmere Port, Neston, North Wales and the wider North West footprint.

We have approximately 855 beds trust-wide and our financial turnover is in excess of £337m.

The Wirral is easily accessible with excellent transport links including motorway, train, bus or ferry and within easy reach to the major cities of Liverpool, Chester and Manchester as well as neighbouring North Wales.

The Pelvic Health Specialist Midwife will be required to develop sound working relationships with external agencies, primary health providers and the Local Maternity & Neonatal System (LMNS) to ensure that clear pathways are established, and education is provided.

They will also form contacts with others in similar posts at other Trusts in the LMNS geography to develop an environment of sharing learning and ultimately form a clinical network.

**Key priority areas for action are**:
**Antenatal**: setting up and running the provision of additional midwifery enhanced support for pregnant women with complex needs such as previous anal sphincter injury and recommendation of mode of next delivery. They will be designing and then use a clear pathway in collaboration with the colorectal and obstetric teams.

**Intrapartum**: Support midwives to suture first and second-degree tears and episiotomies. Support midwives/obstetricians to prevent obstetric anal sphincter injuries and if happens to identify and manage appropriately.

**Postnatal follow up**: stablishing referral pathways forenhanced support for women who have sustained an Obstetric Anal Sphincter Injury (OASI) or have a perineal breakdown promoting a healthy and quick recovery using evidence-based research and multidisciplinary working.

**Learning and Development**: Auditwomen sustaining an OASI and integrate recommendations into colleagues training to reduce rates. Perform a service evaluation of this training programme and cascade to OASI care bundle if appropriate.

Educationof enhanced skills of OASI prevention to Midwives, Students, Obstetricians, Multidisciplinary team and the LMNS. Suturing skills to local staff and develop whether this teaching can be opened to those external to the Trust.

The role of Pelvic Health Specialist Midwife will not be limited to these current priority areas, but they will develop over time. This will ensure that future priorities can be addressed.

**The purpose of this post is to**:
Embed evidence-based practice in antenatal, intrapartum and postnatal care to prevent and mitigate pelvic floor dysfunction resulting from pregnancy and childbirth.

**This will include**:

- Strengthening the antenatal education package for women on the likelihood of Pelvic Floor (PF) dysfunction. This will include staff training to introduce a baseline self-assessment of pelvic health around booking, and ensuring understanding, adoption and adherence to PFMT at all antenatal contacts as a preventative measure.
- Additional antenatal support for those experienc