The country's first National Maternity Strategy has been launched, which aims to improve the quality and safety of mothers and their babies over the next 10 years.

According to the strategy, women should have access to ‘safe, high-quality, nationally consistent, woman-centred maternity care'.

It also states that pregnancy and birth should be recognised as a normal physiological process and where it is safe to do so, the woman's choice in pregnancy and childbirth should be facilitated.

It says that expectant mothers should be offered choices about their care, including whether they want to opt for a home birth, depending on the level of risk involved in each case.

The strategy also highlights the importance of having services that are properly resourced, that have strong and effective management and are delivered by a skilled workforce.

Speaking at the launch of the strategy, the Minister for Health, Leo Varadkar, said that it ‘sets out a vision of maternity services that is about safety, quality and choice and that places women very firmly at the centre of the service'.

The strategy will be delivered via a new National Women and Infants' Health Programme. The aim is to have care offered by multi-disciplinary teams. Each mother will be offered choices depending on their level of risk - normal, medium or high:

-Supported care is intended for normal-risk mothers and babies. Midwives will lead and deliver care within a multidisciplinary framework. Women in this group may choose a home birth
-Assisted care is for mothers and babies at medium risk and for normal risk mothers who choose an obstetric service. Care will be led by a named obstetrician and delivery will be by obstetricians and midwives as a part of a multi-disciplinary team
-Specialised care is for high-risk mothers and babies and will be led by a named obstetrician, with delivery by obstetricians and midwives as part of a multi-disciplinary team.

The strategy was drafted by a Steering Group made up of 31 members, including relevant healthcare professionals and service user representatives.

"The way the Steering Group came together and agreed a new approach augers well for the future of maternity services in Ireland. I urge them all to become champions for the strategy within their own service, and help ensure that it is implemented with the same driving passion that was so prevalent at our meetings," commented the group's chairperson, Sylda Langford.

The strategy has been welcomed by the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO), which said it looks forward to working with the new National Women and Infants' Health Programme.

"This strategy, which was formulated after detailed discussion involving all partners in maternity care, represents a step change in our approach to pregnancy and childbirth. The recommendations place the mother and child at the centre of all services, and will require all members of the multi-disciplinary team to alter existing approaches to facilitate new models of care totally sympathetic to the mother and newborn baby," commented Mary Gorman of the INMO Executive Council, who was a member of the Steering Group.

The INMO called for the full implementation of the strategy to be made a priority.

The strategy was also welcomed by AIMS (Association for Improvements in Maternity Services) Ireland, which said that when implemented, it will ‘offer women and their families increased choices in maternity care'.