**Title: 'Don't be too kind': Maternity staff used offensive terms to refer to pregnant women

Midwives’ documentation was often terse, but a set of three letters scrawled on a whiteboard next to the names of heavily pregnant women carried a sinister meaning. Far from indicating a specific medical requirement or care plan, the acronym "FOH" signaled that staff wanted these women to leave the maternity unit operated by Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust (NUH). The "F" represented a profanity, "O" stood for "OFF," and "H" meant "HOME."

This derogatory shorthand was highlighted in a 2018 resignation letter from a former staff member, a document now reviewed by BBC Panorama, which exposed troubling attitudes within the unit. The same letter revealed that another midwife allegedly instructed colleagues to send pregnant women—who arrived anxious about going into labor—away with the admonition: "Don't be too kind, she'll keep coming back."

Nottingham Trust is currently the focal point of the largest maternity inquiry in NHS history. Chaired by senior midwife Donna Ockenden, the investigation is examining the care provided to approximately 2,500 families between 2012 and 2025 at City Hospital and Queen’s Medical Centre. The inquiry focuses on stillbirths, neonatal and maternal deaths, and injuries sustained by mothers and babies.

Panorama has accessed previously unreleased documents and interviewed ten former midwives, gaining unique insight into the working conditions over the past decade. The inquiry is scheduled to release its findings on June 24. Ockenden told Panorama, "Nottingham thought that there was a Nottingham way, that they were some kind of superior NHS trust compared to others."

Anthony May, the trust’s current chief executive, was not in his role when these allegations were made but has pledged to address the issues. He stated to the BBC, "We need to take accountability as an organisation."

A persistent theme in many of the poor outcomes in Nottingham has been the determination to keep women at home for as long as possible. One midwife recounted an incident where a woman calling to report she was in labor was told admission was unnecessary. "When she came in, her baby was dead. The mother's perineum and vaginal wall collapsed because she'd been left to labour for so long. She now has a stoma bag," the midwife said.

The offensive remarks detailed in the 2018 resignation letter, written by a senior midwife, also included an account of overhearing a colleague say, "I've never had to tell a woman so loudly, and so often, that she would kill her baby if she didn't push."

Panorama shared the letter’s contents, including the "FOH" references, with Sarah Hawkins. Her concerns had been ignored for six days prior to the stillbirth of her daughter, Harriet, in 2016. "That's quite upsetting for me to hear. The last phone call I made to a ward manager, she might as well have just said that to me," Hawkins said, referring to the FOH initials. "Who writes that in a caring profession?"

Conversations with former employees revealed a toxic, bullying culture that persisted within Nottingham’s maternity services for years. One midwife described a junior colleague who had been promised support while caring for a "complicated woman," only to be ignored when she buzzed for help. "The co-ordinator and her cronies were busy shopping for handbags online," the midwife recalled.

Alongside these poor attitudes, chronic understaffing was prevalent. A community midwife, who was frequently required to work in the trust’s maternity units due to shortages, noted, "They [management] would say the levels of staffing were safe, but they definitely weren't."

Source: BBC News Generated at: 2026-06-01 05:00:04 UTC