Job summary
The Maternal Medicine Specialist Midwife will play a pivotal role in leading the implementation and delivery of the Maternal Care Bundle (MCB) across County Durham and Darlington NHS Foundation Trust (CDDFT). The MCB establishes best practice standards across five key clinical areas associated with maternal mortality and morbidity, with the overarching aim of improving maternal outcomes and reducing health inequalities.
This specialist role will provide strategic leadership and coordination for the implementation of the MCB across both acute and community maternity services. The postholder will be responsible for developing and overseeing a Trust-wide approach to delivery, ensuring alignment with national standards and local quality improvement priorities.
Main duties of the job
This specialist role will provide strategic leadership and coordination for the implementation of the MCB across both acute and community maternity services. The postholder will be responsible for developing and overseeing a Trust-wide approach to delivery, ensuring alignment with national standards and local quality improvement priorities.
Given the multidisciplinary nature of maternal medicine, the role will require effective collaboration with a wide range of stakeholders, including obstetric, medical and anaesthetic teams, emergency and ambulance services, mental health services, primary care colleagues, and regional networks. A whole-system approach will therefore be essential to achieving sustainable improvements in care.
A key initial responsibility will be to establish a baseline assessment of current practice against the five elements of the Maternal Care Bundle:Element 1: Venous Thromboembolism (VTE)Element 2: Pre-hospital and Acute Care Element 3: Epilepsy in PregnancyElement 4: Maternal Mental Health Element 5: Obstetric Haemorrhage
These elements have been identified nationally due to their significant contribution to maternal mortality and morbidity, and because there is considerable opportunity to reduce unwarranted variation in care.
NHS Provider Trusts are required to achieve full implementation of the Maternal Care Bundle by March 2027.
About us
If you are being interviewed you must accept an interview slot in the system to continue, even if you have arranged with the manager.
You must be able to produce ALL certificates stated essential in the person specification or you will not be able to complete pre-employment checks.
We provide hospital services from two acute sites - Darlington Memorial Hospital and University Hospital of North Durham. We have a centre for planned care in Bishop Auckland and provide care from community hospitals in Chester-le-Street, Shotley Bridge, Barnard Castle, Sedgefield and Weardale as well as over 80 other community based settings and providing care in patients' homes.
We particularly welcome applications from disabled and Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) candidates as BAME and disabled people are currently under-represented.
Full Job Descriptions can be found in the adverts supporting documents.
Over reliance on AI-generated content is discouraged and may diminish the applicant's chances of success.
For the most up-to-date information on visa requirements and eligibility, please check online to determine whether you can apply.
Details
- Date posted: 16 June 2026
- Pay scheme: Agenda for change
- Band: Band 7
- Salary: £49,387 to £56,515 a year per annum / pro rata
- Contract: Permanent
- Working pattern: Full-time
- Reference number: C9439-2627-926
- Job locations: Darlington Memorial Hospital NHS Trust, Hollyhurst Road, Darlington, County Durham, DL3 6HX, United Kingdom, University Hospital Of North Durham, North Road, DURHAM, DH1 5TW, United Kingdom
Job responsibilities
The Maternal Medicine Specialist Midwife will be responsible for implementing:
benchmarking current compliance and developing an improvement plan with trajectories for sign off by the service, care group and trust board.
providing regular reports to the service, care group and trust board on implementation against this plan and trajectories, so that the board can oversee, support and challenge local delivery. To deliver against this aim the postholder will need to work closely with other stakeholders including relevant medical and surgical specialties, gynaecology and urgent and emergency care, as appropriate.
ensuring that where local plans do not meet nationally recommended pathways, timescales or performance, or where local delivery subsequently deviates from these plans, this is escalated within the service, care group and trust and if required to the regional NHS England team.
engaging with maternal medicine networks. This means co-producing and complying with the local networks protocol for the management and referral of medical problems in pregnancy, across all relevant medical specialties and settings.
local reporting of routine care data relating to key process and outcome measures for each element as defined in the national implementation tool.
The aim is to provide equitable and expert support for women with pre-existing or pregnancy-induced significant medical issues, to ensure sustainability of that care wherever in the region they may live, and additionally, to provide local best practice care or another onward referral as required.
The post holder will work for CDDFT and coordinate care for service users requiring support from either one of the specialist centres alongside services delivered within the region.
The postholder will have responsibility for the effective and efficient maternal medicine service within CDDFT. S/he/they provide clinical and professional management and leadership for the maternal medicine service. The postholder is responsible for ensuring the assessment of care needs and development, implementation, and evaluation of programmes of care are maintained to a high standard. S/he/they manages the reporting aspects of the maternal medicine and ensures cost effective use of resources
Person specification
Experience
Essential
- Significant experience post registration
- Experience of managing and leading a team
- Current issues on healthcare
- Experience of leading, motivation and supporting a team
- Experience of providing training
- Excellent presentation skills
- Experience of delegating workload and monitoring progress
- Evidence of managerial development
- Clinical audit and standard setting
- Experience of managing resources
- Service development and/or change management
- Experience of training staff
Desirable
- Service development and/or change management
- Experience of working within Maternal Medicine
Qualifications
Essential
- Registered Midwife masters degree or demonstrable evidence they are working at that level
- Recognised teaching/assessing qualification
- Evidence of continued professional development
- Willing to undergo training as necessary
Special Requirement
Essential
- Commitment to drive service improvement
- Creative and innovative thinker, objective with high level of integrity
- Adaptable and flexible approach to work
- Team worker
- Able to foster positive relationships with co-workers and work across professional and organisational boundaries
- Able to motivate others
- Able to deal with difficult and complex situations
Statutory Registration
Essential
- Registered Midwife with NMC
Specials Skills & Knowledge
Essential
- Knowledge and understanding of relevant National Services Frameworks
- Knowledge of Trust guidelines and policies
- Knowledge of care pathways for women with complex health need
- Awareness of current issues in midwifery
- Capable of lateral thinking
- Influencing and negotiation
- Skills in identifying and securing provision of training needs for the team
- Highly developed communication skills, written and verbal
- Delegation abilities and excellent time management skills
- Listening/counselling skills
- Well-developed problem solving and decision-making skills
- Flexibility/adaptability to meet the needs of the service
- Self-awareness
- Possess individual credibility
- Approachable
- Has strategic vision and demonstrates innovation in practice
- Ability to work under pressure, thinking and acting coherently and with respect for others
- Manage and identify stress in self and others
- Excellent written and verbal skills
- Ability to organise and prioritise own and other workloads
- Understanding of skills and knowledge required to lead and develop team members
- Resource management
- Ability to take the lead in the promotion of evidence-based practice
- Excellent IT skills, including Word, Excel
- Power-point, and Outlook
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Applying for this NHS job
This advert is for Maternal Medicine Specialist Midwife with County Durham and Darlington NHS Foundation Trust in Darlington, North East and Yorkshire, England. It is listed as a Band 7 Midwife role. The advertised salary is £49,387 to £56,515 a year. The contract type is Permanent. The application deadline is 14 Jul 2026.
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