Our Perinatal Mental Health Service consists of two specialised community teams – one in southern Derbyshire and the other in north Derbyshire - and an acute inpatient unit in Derby, called The Beeches. It provides treatment for women experiencing mental health problems either during pregnancy or after pregnancy.
Learn more about our services and how to refer into them by clicking on one of the buttons below. Or read on to learn more about what perinatal mental health is, and the East Midlands collaborative that we lead to improve inpatient perinatal services.
About perinatal mental health
Perinatal mental health problems are those which happen during pregnancy or in the first year following the birth of a child. Perinatal mental illness affects up to 20% of women and covers a wide range of conditions. There may be ongoing mental health issues that a mother may be already aware of, or a period of mental ill health which is triggered during pregnancy or after birth.
Many women experiencing perinatal mental health problems are supported by community teams and can remain living at home, but those with acute needs are able to receive inpatient care in mother and baby units such as The Beeches in Derby and the Margaret Oates unit in Nottingham.
East Midlands Perinatal Mental Health Collaborative
On 1 October 2023, the running of inpatient mental health services for pregnant women and new mothers in the East Midlands region became the responsibility of a new local partnership of healthcare providers.
The services – officially called perinatal mental health inpatient services – were previously overseen by NHS England Specialised Commissioning. Now, in line with changes set out in the NHS Long Term Plan, they will be overseen by a group of five NHS trusts and one private healthcare provider from the region, who are working together as the East Midlands Perinatal Mental Health Provider Collaborative.
The collaborative will maintain the high quality of perinatal services that are already provided in the East Midlands and seek to further improve the experience of service users and their families and carers. The collaborative is led by clinicians and is involving experts by experience to ensure that the service user’s voice is heard at every stage of their treatment and recovery.
About the collaborative
The members of the collaborative are:
- Derbyshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust (lead provider)
- Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust
- Lincolnshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust
- Northamptonshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust
- Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust
- St Andrew’s Healthcare (Associate Partner role).
While Derbyshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust is the lead provider, all partners have an equal say in how the provider collaborative is run.
Although the collaborative will focus on the quality of care of the inpatient (hospital-based) perinatal mental health services, an important principle of the collaborative is that it supports and informs work across all perinatal mental health services. This is why all providers of perinatal mental health services in the East Midlands are partners in the collaborative, including those who only provide community perinatal services.
The collaborative is one of several launched by members of the East Midlands Mental Health, Learning Disabilities and Autism Alliance to ensure that specialised mental health services offer high-quality care to people in the region.
