Media Release: Inspection report Forth Valley Royal Hospital, NHS Forth Valley
Healthcare Improvement Scotland today (Thursday 27 November) published a report relating to a Maternity Services Safe Delivery of Care inspection visit to Forth Valley Royal Hospital, NHS Forth Valley. We carried out the unannounced inspection of maternity services at the hospital on 25-26 August 2025.
Speaking of the report, Donna Maclean, Chief Inspector, Healthcare Improvement Scotland, said:
“During our inspection of the maternity services we saw staff providing compassionate and responsive care to women and their families. Women we spoke with were complimentary of the care they received and the staff providing it.
“We saw good multidisciplinary teamwork and visible senor midwifery leadership and student midwives described a friendly and supportive learning environment. There were a variety of initiatives for staff well-being and we received feedback from staff of supportive senior leadership.
“Areas for improvement included improved oversight of activity within the maternity unit to support the safe delivery of care, including delays to care within maternity triage. We also observed the need for improved governance and oversight of adverse events to ensure these are reliably reported and identified improvement actions implemented in good time.”
Chief Inspector, Healthcare Improvement Scotland
Other areas for improvement identified included systems and processes to ensure consistent and accurate assessment of real-time staffing risks. Fire safety training, mandatory training compliance for obstetricians and midwives and the safe storage of medicines were also areas highlighted for improvement.
Speaking of our expansion of Safe Delivery of Care inspections into maternity services, Eddie Docherty, Director of Quality Assurance and Regulation, said:
“In response to Healthcare Improvement Scotland’s Neonatal Mortality Review in 2024, we made a commitment to expanding our Safe Delivery of Care inspection approach to include inpatient maternity services. The maternity inspections will provide women, and families with an assessment of the quality of care provided by their local maternity service and an independent review of any required improvements.
“Our organisation is also producing a set of standards for maternity services, which will in time support our inspection process for maternity services.”
Director of Quality Assurance and Regulation
The maternity services inspection at Forth Valley Royal Hospital resulted in nine areas of good practice, two recommendations and 11 requirements.
An improvement action plan has been developed by NHS Forth Valley to meet the requirements for maternity services.
The full Forth Valley maternity inspection report is available to view at: https://www.healthcareimprovementscotland.scot/publications/forth-valley-royal-hospital-maternity-safe-delivery-of-care-inspection-november-2025/
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Notes to editor
This report is part of Healthcare Improvement Scotland’s programme of inspections and reviews.
Healthcare Improvement Scotland’s statutory role is to help improve the quality of health and care, provide information to the public about the quality of health and care services, monitor public involvement, and to evaluate and provide advice on the clinical and cost-effectiveness of medicines and health technologies.