Free bus travel to get pregnant women to hospital

Vulnerable pregnant women are to be provided with free travel passes to enable them to get to their hospital appointments.

In a partnership between First Bus and Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, 100 travel passes will be made available every month up until next March.

The bus operator said they would be given to women "mainly from minority and disadvantaged communities" to enable them to attend important check-ups and other appointments.

First Bus said a review of records by the trust estimated that every month 100 pregnant women struggled to make hospital appointments because they had no access to funding support or faced other barriers.

Nada Abdul-Majid, specialist midwife health equity at the trust, said the free travel passes would make "a real difference to mothers and babies".

"I've seen first-hand how women struggle to get to their hospital appointments if they don't have enough money to use public transport," she said.

She said while the trust's Haamla team, which provides support for pregnant women from ethnic minority communities, including asylum seekers and refugees, carried out home visits, it was important they were able to travel to hospital for appointments such as scans and labour and obstetric emergencies.

The bus operator said it would distribute the passes to women based on travel needs following a financial assessment which would be carried out during their initial appointment with the maternity team.

The trust will monitor use of the tickets and is able to track attendance at clinics to review the effect of the travel support and outcomes for expectant mothers, it added.

Zoe Hands, managing director of First Bus Franchising, which includes the West Yorkshire region, said: "Supporting communities in the areas we serve means, where we can, being able to assist people in all stages of life.

"Nothing can be more important than helping to ensure the health and welfare of mothers-to-be and the benefits this will bring to their newborn children."

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