Chesterfield midwife struck off for providing '˜sub-standard' care

Amanda Jayne Huntingdon, formerly a midwife with the Chesterfield Royal NHS Foundation Trust, faced disciplinary charges over her treatment of the five women in 2011.

She admitted her failure to notice “suspicious” changes in a baby’s heart rate during a woman’s labour and to regularly record another’s blood pressure.

She also faced criticism relating to her treatment of three other patients and was accused of ‘sub-standard care’, poor record keeping and a ‘serious medication error’.

She was also said to have been ‘dismissive in her attitude’ at times, failing to recognise that her errors were serious.

She was suspended by the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) in 2014 after she was found guilty of misconduct.

And now the NMC’s conduct and competence committee has struck her off - after she volunteered to bow out of the profession.

The committee said she had admitted all the charges and had “engaged” fully in the disciplinary process.

“Mrs Huntingdon had been a loyal and committed employee with a previously clean disciplinary record”, the panel added.

She had said in a statement: “I am deeply regretful my actions during the time my health was impaired.

“I am grateful that no-one suffered any lasting damage due to my omissions”.

She had “reflected at length over past events”, before concluding: “I do not at any time wish to return to practice”.

The committee said that, despite her regrets, Mrs Huntingdon had yet to show that she had “remedied her past failings”.

And there was therefore “a risk of repetition” if she went back to working as a midwife.

The panel said it would have allowed Mrs Huntingdon to return to practice after a further period of suspension and retraining.

But, in what the committee described as an unusual case, she had said that she “would welcome removal from the register”.

The panel concluded that a further suspension would be “futile” and that a striking off order was “appropriate and proportionate”.