"Induction on the maternity ward"

I would not recommend being induced at Leicester General. I had an awful experience and no longer want more children as a result. I don't want to go into most of the details as it still upsets me a great deal after months have passed. These are some of the edited 'highlights'. The worst part was once moved to the delivery suite and in a lot of pain, I was told the midwife would be back in 15 minutes to check me over. An hour and a half later she had still not come back, with no explanation despite me asking other staff. Eventually it turned out she had gone into theatre and no-one had bothered to tell me. At this point I was still only on paracetamol, having been refused any other painkillers for over 12 hours (when I had been given pethidine, which wore off after a few hours). To find out where she had gone I had to leave the delivery suite and wander the corridors in pain trying to find staff. In general, the approach to pain management was inconsistent and in my view insufficient. I felt my dignity and peace of mind were compromised by allowing me to suffer with insufficient pain relief. In addition, they wrote in my notes that I was no longer allowed codeine, then carried on giving me it anyway. One midwife came and told me I 'should eat my lunch', when I was crying from the pain 5 hours after the pethidine wore off. Other minor grumbles include the amount of noise made by staff clattering, banging and having shouted conversations in corridors from 5.30 am- not ideal when you are spending 3 days in hospital being induced, are in pain and shattered and are trying to get some rest. While I was at the hospital, they closed to new admissions as they were too busy. It was clear that they were woefully understaffed and that there was not good enough communication to keep patients informed. Once the midwife returned from theatre I felt more looked after, but by this stage I feel that events were irreparably affected by having spent hours without adequate pain relief and extremely worried, which resulted in a much more difficult birth than I think would otherwise have been the case, with a bad effect on my blood pressure and necessitating more and more interventions. A couple of staff shone through as caring, most were far too busy to be able to perform well, and one was just unpleasant. I rarely saw the same staff twice and it was a 'conveyor belt' system. As I said, a horrific experience which I never want to repeat.