Hospital operations manager Janeen Holmes confirmed this week that "briefly, it looked as though we [Lakes District Hospital] may have had a three-hour gap on the maternity roster for a core midwife" last Friday.
The roster ended up being filled by casual staff and the staffing gap did not eventuate, Ms Holmes said.
She said the hospital's maternity wing would have remained "open and accessible" for lead maternity carers (LMC midwives) "and their backups", even if the three-hour gap had eventuated.
The Otago Daily Times asked the Southern District Health Board how the potential shortage was communicated to staff and patients, what caused the incident, how often had that kind of situation occurred at Lakes District Hospital and was a similar situation expected to occur again.
No response was provided to those questions, but Ms Holmes said managing rosters was an "ongoing challenge in a healthcare setting, so gaps will occur from time to time, although we have contingencies available in case of emergencies".
The incident comes after Alexandra's Charlotte Jean Maternity Hospital had two recent periods during which the birthing facility's own backup staff were unavailable.
The first was an 11-hour period on July 9, when Charlotte Jean's own midwives and nurses were unavailable to provide backup or post-natal support for lead maternity carer midwives, who were asked to arrange their own backup from other midwives.
No births occurred at Charlotte Jean during that time, but leading up to July 9 two women who gave birth in Queen Mary Hospital needed to stay there for post-natal support rather than be transferred to Charlotte Jean.
The second period was 36 hours over the weekend of July 13-14, when Charlotte Jean's backup staff member was a registered nurse, not a midwife, so Central Otago lead maternity carers also needed to arrange their own backup midwife support.
