Staffing levels are not to blame for worse obstetric outcomes at weekends, study finds

The reasons why being born in an NHS hospital during the week is safer for babies and their mothers needs investigating, commentators have said, after a study found that staffing levels at the weekends were not to blame.

The study, published in The BMJ, found that babies born to women admitted to hospital at the weekend had a slightly higher risk of death in the first seven days than those born during the week.1

Researchers from Imperial College London analysed over 1.3 million …