{"id":743026,"date":"2026-08-19T14:22:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-19T14:22:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/743026\/"},"modified":"2026-08-19T14:22:09","modified_gmt":"2026-08-19T14:22:09","slug":"top-nhs-boss-resigns-in-protest-over-maternity-services-closure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/743026\/","title":{"rendered":"Top NHS boss resigns in protest over maternity services closure"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dr Karen Davies said fragilities in the service have been known about for several years\"North<\/p>\n

North Devon District Hospital(Image: Roger A Smith (https:\/\/www.geograph.org.uk\/photo\/3076307))<\/p>\n

The medical director of a Devon health trust has resigned in protest at a decision to suspend birthing services at North Devon<\/a> District Hospital.<\/p>\n

Dr Karen Davies said she could not support the way the Royal Devon University Healthcare NHS<\/a> Foundation Trust (RDUH) is handling the maternity situation.<\/p>\n

Birthing services at the Ladywell unit were temporarily suspended on August 11 due to a lack of doctors, leaving women with long journeys to get to Exeter<\/a> or Taunton to give birth.<\/p>\n

The trust says it is committed to reopening the unit as soon as possible, possibly by the end of September, but the closure was slammed as \u201ca catastrophic failure of senior management\u201d by Devon County Council<\/a> leader Julian Brazil (Lib Dem, Kingbridge) this week which had left women \u201canxious\u201d and \u201cterrified\u201d.<\/p>\n

According to the BBC<\/a> Dr Karen Davies wrote in her resignation letter: \u201cI am leaving my job because I cannot support the way the trust has handled, and is handling, the maternity situation.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have known for several years that there have been concerns about fragility, as well as safety and culture, in the northern maternity unit.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said she was concerned a proposal for additional support which “could have produced a plan to avoid closure” was not brought in.<\/p>\n

Her decision to bring her retirement forward had not been taken lightly and several colleagues had asked her to stay.<\/p>\n

“But ultimately I have to accept that my repeated warnings and concerns over the last two years have not been heard and have not been acted upon,” her letter added.<\/p>\n

North Devon Council member Paul Crabb (Con, Ilfracombe<\/a> ) who spoke out against the trust\u2019s decision at a meeting of Devon County Council\u2019s health and adult care scrutiny committee on Monday, calling it \u201csudden and chaotic\u201d, said: \u201cIt is sad that someone with that level of experience feels that the only way that can get action is to resign.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said the meeting this week to grill senior health leaders together with documents released by the trust since the announcement revealed just how fragile all services were at NDDH and that there appeared to be a \u201cgravitational pull\u201d to centralise services at Exeter.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe now know there is stress and shortfalls across the whole system in North Devon. This whole episode is a massive wake-up call,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Health bosses have denied that NDDH is being \u201cdeliberately downgraded\u201d and said the decision to suspend birthing services had been taken because it was not safe to continue after a locum doctor left the small team of consultant obstetricians and registrars and another had to travel overseas because of sudden bereavement.<\/p>\n

Dr Vanessa Purday, chief medical officer at RDUH, said the decision \u201cweighed heavily on her and her colleagues\u201d but the safety of women and their babies was \u201can overriding consideration\u201d.<\/p>\n

Devon County Council is stepping in to organise transport for women to Exeter who have no access to private transport during the temporary suspension.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dr Karen Davies said fragilities in the service have been known about for several years North Devon District…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":743027,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[243,49167,19348,102,2960,39062,3596,104,229,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-743026","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-bbc","tag-devon-county-council","tag-exeter","tag-health","tag-healthcare","tag-ilfracombe","tag-liberal-democrats","tag-nhs","tag-politics","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/743026","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=743026"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/743026\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/743027"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=743026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=743026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=743026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}