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An award-winning midwife at Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust has been awarded an MBE in the King’s New Year’s Honours for her outstanding services to bereavement midwifery.

The honour for Trudy Berlet, Maternity Matron for Community, Continuity of Carer and Bereavement, recognises her outstanding work dedicated to women and families who have been through maternity bereavement.

The recognition follows Trudy receiving the Midwifery Gold Award – the highest honour of NHS England’s National Chief Nursing and Chief Midwifery Officer Awards – in 2022.

Trudy has many years of experience as a midwife and more recently as a bereavement midwife for 9 years.  In that time, she has worked passionately to improve the experiences of bereaved families across the county, and raised tens of thousands of pounds for additional and upgraded Bereavement Suite facilities at Worcestershire Royal Hospital.

She said: “This honour is a huge surprise and a privilege. The changes in bereavement care have only been possible due to the hard work and dedication of the incredibly supportive multidisciplinary Team that I work alongside. We have been able to work together to improve individualised and compassionate bereavement care. The bereaved families that we have cared for within Women & Children’s Directorate have been inspiring and supportive, their guidance has helped us to shape a responsive and compassionate service that is valued by families and staff alike. I am hugely grateful to be nominated.”

Sarah Shingler, Chief Nursing Officer at Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust, said: “I am so pleased that Trudy has been honoured in this way, recognising the amazing care that she has delivered, and continues to deliver. She is a dedicated and passionate midwife who has made a huge contribution to maternity care across Worcestershire and her MBE is truly deserved.”  

Justine Jeffrey, Director of Midwifery at Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust, said: “Trudy’s individualised, compassionate care to parents and families when their whole world has been turned upside down is inspirational. I know that they, along with the team here at the Trust who have the pleasure of working with Trudy, will join me in congratulating her on this wonderful achievement.”