Report book on maternity cases at Warneford Hospital

Ms maternity report book of Warneford Hospital (1955), recording cases of abortion, cardiac disease, mental illness, pre-eclampsia, eclampsia, placenta previa, tumours associated with pregnancy, prolonged labour, breech deliveries, multiple pregnancy, contracted pelvis, failed forceps deliveries, prolapse and presentation of cord, post partum haemorrhage, surgical induction of labour, caesarean sections, puerperal pyrexia, maternal death and other special cases of interest, as well as details of stillbirths, neonatal deaths, premature infants, congenital malformations, birth trauma, neonatal infections and other neonatal diseases, including the results of these complications experienced during and after childbirth on the mother and child.

Warneford Hospital (formally known as the Radcliffe Asylum until 1843) was established in 1826. It was a paying hospital for the middle classes, although in due course a fund for poor patients was established as well. The Warneford Committee of Management purchased surrounding land at every opportunity and eventually there were about 150 acres. The extensive grounds were not only regarded as pleasure and exercise grounds for the patients but they also provided flowers for the hospital rooms and fruit and vegetables for the table. After Second World War the Committee had to decide whether or not to join the National Health Service. Indeed it had its own Hospital Management Committee until 1968, when it was united with the Littlemore Hospital under the Isis Hospital Management Committee. Both hospitals became part of Oxfordshire Area Health Authority (Teaching) in 1974, Oxfordshire Health Authority in 1982, Oxfordshire Mental Healthcare NHS Trust in 1994, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust in 2008, and are now part of Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust

Access restrictions may apply if material includes personal information of living individuals. All other records are open to research by appointment, Monday to Friday, 10am to 4pm. For further information about accessing the collection and visiting the reading room, please contact: archives@rcog.co.uk

There is no record of the date or source of acquisition before the collection was deposited at the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists in May 2011.

Catalogued by Clare Sexton, Project Archivist in accordance with ISAD(G).

Further details of the contents of this material are available on request.

If you wish to reproduce this material, apply via the College Archivist: archives@rcog.co.uk

This collection was originally deposited at the Royal College of Midwives. It is now held under the terms of a service level collection care agreement at the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists.

Addition records relating to Warneford Hospital are held at Oxfordshire Health Archives.