Rates of stillborn babies at Bacchus Marsh Hospital in Victoria have hit appalling highs, with the blame being put on poor resources and staff error.
A source linked to the hospital spoke to Kidspot, saying: “I’d personally never have a baby there. When there’s complications, there just isn’t enough staff or equipment available.”
“The staff really do their best but you can only do so much with what you have,” she continued.
Bacchus Marsh Hospital
ABC’s recent 7.30 report unveiled there were 18 stillborn cases between 2013 and 2014 and according to Health Minister Jill Hennessy, seven of those deaths could have been prevented.
One case involved a mother identified as Jacinta. This would be the birth of her second child, named Ruby. Telling 7.30 her story, she said she knew something was wrong and told everyone she could at the time.
“She didn’t move. I just knew straight away something was not right,” sharing details of the 2009 birth. “I raised it with the doctor, I raised it with the midwives.”
“They’d hear her heartbeat and go, ‘Oh, there’s her heartbeat.’ They’d put the CTG on and then they’d send me home, say, ‘We can see that she’s moving. She’s fine’,” she said.
Bacchus Marsh didn’t identify that Jacinta had suffered from a condition known as Intrauterine Growth Restriction which meant her uterus did not grow to accommodate her growing baby.
Two days later when she’d gone back to hospital, they discovered that Ruby had died. She was then told that she had to travel to Ballarat, 56km away, to deliver the baby because Bacchus Marsh didn’t have the capacity to do it.
“It was one of the most painful, gut-wrenching things I’ve ever, ever been through in my life,” told Jacinta.
Several doctors – some of which are still practising at Bacchus Marsh – have been sued multiple times for negligence or reported to authorities. Two of those in particular are Surinder Parhar and Claude Calandra, and the legal cases were settled.
A wider investigation into the doctors is underway.
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