Trust celebrates 25 years of ‘making miracles’ at Oliver Fisher Special Care Baby Unit at Medway Maritime Hospital

It started off with a couple of incubators crammed into a corner of a rapidly declining Victorian maternity hospital.

And then 25 years ago the care of sick and premature babies was transferred to Medway Maritime Hospital - now one of the busiest neonatal intensive care units in the country.

Its transformation was largely down to one man - Dr Oliver Fisher, an eminent clinician with a keen interest in paediatrics and neonatal medicine.

The forward-thinking Dr Fisher initially opened his special care baby unit in 1982 at All Saints’ Hospital in Chatham which was built as a workhouse and closed in 1999.

At the time the care of newborn sick and premature babies was still in its infancy and in some cases, tiny patients weighing just a few pounds would be sent home with little or no chance of survival.

In 1983 the new unit was finally built in the grounds of All Saints’ having taken Dr Fisher 27 years to fulfil his dream of a designated department for poorly babies.

It was a step in the right direction, but it was another 16 years before the ward we know today was created.

The unit on level 3 is on the same floor as the delivery suites at the main hospital and babies needing help can be whisked along the corridor within minutes.

It has 36 cots across four wards which are, intensive care, high dependency, transitional care and special care.

As one of the highest level of neonatal care providers, it takes in babies from all over Kent and further afield.

There are about 90 staff and among them nine consultants, a neonatal matron with the department headed by Dr Aung Soe, a consultant neonatologist.

Dr Soe is the mainstay of the dedicated team and is also chairman of the Oliver Fisher Special Care Baby Trust which raises money for extra equipment and facilities on top of NHS funding.

He said: “It is very humbling to think about how the provision of care around Neonates has changed over the last 25 years, and I am very proud and lucky to have seen that at the Oliver Fisher Neonatal Unit.

“The demand for our service has grown and, in turn, so has the unit.

“For example in 1999, the year the unit moved from All Saints’, we saw 439 admissions while this last year saw 1300.

“In that same time, 14 medical staff became 29, and that isn’t to speak of the nursing increase too.

“It is incredible to think of how many lives have been impacted on this unit in a quarter of a century, and how many more will be in the future.”

The first baby to be transferred from All Saints’ in Magpie Hall Road to the new site was Alice Lawrence who, now aged 25, is a trustee along with her twin sister Olivia.

Their father Geoff Lawrence is the trust’s treasurer, who along with his wife Jacqui remembers vividly little Alice being taken to the high dependency unit with all its shiny new equipment.

The girls were born on June 19, 1999 at 35 weeks at All Saints’. Alice weighing 4lbs 3oz and Olivia 5lbs 3oz.

While mum Jacqui and Olivia were eventually allowed home, despite a traumatic birth Alice’s condition deteriorated and her weight plummeted.

Geoff said: “The impending move to the new unit at Medway Maritime Hospital was now at the forefront of everyone’s mind and staff were keen to ensure that as few babies as possible needed to be transferred.

“Alice became a TV star and was filmed being transferred by ambulance to her new home.

Geoff, who has worked in the health sector for decades, immediately saw the stark contrast between the two sites.

He said: “Where we were with the twins at All Saints’ was known as The Cupboard.

“The place was being run down from the early 90s and there had been no investment for years.

“This was bringing it into the 21st century.”

Geoff, who lives in Bapchild, added: “Everyone knows somebody who has been helped by the Oliver Fisher unit and we have some very loyal supporters.

“There’s one lady whose baby needed help 28 years ago and she is still donating.”

The trust raises thousands of pounds a year and is one of the most popular charities in the area with individuals and organisations donating mountains of knitted garments and blankets for the little ones.

“Alice and Olivia are now trustees repaying all that love, care and devotion expended on them so that the unit can continue to provide world-class service to all who require it.”

Alice, a regular visitor to the place where she spent her touch-and-go first few weeks of her life, said: “Being part of the charity means so much.

“It’s all about giving back and we encourage everyone to interact with the charity. The unit is a vital service and helps so many families who never know when they are going to need it.”

This year it paid for two new double cots and 10 single cots, replacing old-fashioned “plastic bucket-style beds”, at a total cost of £40,000.

This means that twins or triplets, who don’t need incubators can be nursed together which Dr Soe believes can help stabilise heart rates and oxygen levels as well as build a bond between them.

The charity has also funded furnishings for the bereavement suite and also helps pay for specialist transport if babies have to be transferred to another hospital in the UK.

Hannah Grout, who is the trust's PR manager, oversees much of the fundraising for a cause very close to her heart.

Her daughter Maggie, now aged six, was born 28 weeks weighing 2lb 10oz and Hannah spent the first few weeks staying at her bedside.

A charity fun run at Capstone Farm Country Park in Chatham recently raised a whopping £17,000 with several hundred people of all ages taking part.

Among the runners with a special reason for going along was Alexa Goodger, from Walderslade, who had life-saving treatment at the unit when she was born at 31 weeks.

She said: “Running this race is super personal to me and happens to fall the day before my 34th birthday.

“It’s safe to say without Oliver Fisher SCBU I wouldn’t be here celebrating any birthdays, which is why I would like to raise as much money as possible for the ward I owe my life to.”

KentOnline has spoken to two families who say they owe life-long gratitude to staff at the unit who saved their treasured poorly new-borns.

Natalie Iles had a normal pregnancy and went full term with no problems as she and her husband Seb looked forward to the arrival of their second son.

But after giving birth to Oscar weighing a healthy 8lb 15oz, at Pembury Hospital, their world turned upside down.

Little Oscar was not breathing and needed lifesaving treatment which was not available at the maternity wing near their Tunbridge Wells home.

Oscar was blue-lighted in an ambulance with specialist nurses and equipment to the Oliver Fisher unit where he remained for the next three weeks before eventually he could breathe without the aid of oxygen.

Natalie immediately discharged herself to be with her baby, who contracted sepsis, 24 miles away.

The couple have the utmost praise for the staff who took them through their darkest days offering comfort and support.

The 40-year-old recruitment manager said: ”We were told he was as sick as he could be and might not make it through the night.”

Natalie had to return home to look after their other son Alfie, then aged six, and she’s indebted to the nurses who updated her all the time she could not make the journey.

She said: “They showed kindness and compassion.

“They did not give you false hope but also gave you hope even if it’s only one per cent.”

Oscar has just celebrated his sixth birthday. The family still keep in touch with staff and Natalie remains friends with some of the mums on Facebook.

Shannel Monks, 21, went into labour with her first baby at 25 weeks after going to Medway hospital complaining of what she thought was constipation.

She was given laxatives and kept in overnight with her partner Jason Dennis by her bedside.

Shannel would have given birth in the toilet had she not screamed for help to Jason who was waiting in the nearby examination room.

Sammie-Jay, weighing just 1lb 4oz was rushed next door to the unit where he spent nearly the next four months battling illness, before being allowed back to the family home in Eastchurch on the Isle of Sheppey.

Dad Jason, also 21, added: “I can honestly say they are the most incredible people in the world. We owe them everything.”

To show his thanks, Jason completed a Thrill Seeker abseil raising £1,125 for the trust while his son was still under care in the ward.

Sarah Clarke, matron for the unit, said: “At the Oliver Fisher Neonatal Unit, we pride ourselves being the best we can be, and giving the best possible care to patients and their families.

“NHS funding is amazing but that can only go that far. The charity gives us the ability to boost our provisions that bit further, and save more precious lives.”

As mum Hannah Grout sums up: “No parent wants to be in the Oliver Fisher unit. But once they are here, they see it’s the place where miracles happen.”