Covid-19-savvy firm shifts to sewing gowns for midwives

Pam and Darren Fountain have run DPEK, trading as Birth Supplies, in Coningsby for the past seven years.

Pam explained: “We traditionally supply midwives with kit like water birthing pools, but when the units began needing gowns and PPE because of coronavirus they couldn’t get hold of any because everything was being taken up by the NHS hospitals.”

Although not dealing with Covid patients all the time, midwives still have to get intimately close to their patients. To respond to the need, the business took on an extra four local seamstresses and started producing the gowns and caps needed.

Pam said: “I made my wedding dress and bridesmaid dresses and looking at the patterns for the gowns it seemed quite simple.”

As other health care providers found out, the requests for supplies came flooding in, until Pam says they are now churning out 500 items a week and hoping to increase, making them regular items in stock. She said: “Being in the industry we knew at some point the NHS would struggle to source equipment while the whole world was trying to source the same stuff.”

Shrewdly they source their fabric from British suppliers. The four local seamstresses work off-site and the finished gowns are safely collected and dispatched to customers.

Pam said: “I have just had an order for 700 caps from an NHS trust in Liverpool. Unlike a lot of companies we do not expect customers to order in bulk of thousands and we do not vary our prices as there are a lot of small units that still need PPE but do not have the buying power of the big trusts.”

She felt NHS trusts should support UK supply chains in the longer term.

Meanwhile business is booming with the seven other members of staff also being kept busy doing overtime.

“Our home birthing pool sales have increased as well as people have been wary about going in to hospital where Covid-19 patients go,” Pam said.