LIVERPOOL’S Women's Hospital is hoping to build the world’s first centre dedicated to helping stop miscarriages and improve childbirth.

The hospital, which is the largest in Europe, delivering 8,100 babies each year, has launched a £3m appeal.

The new Centre for Better Birth will lead the world in discovering why women miscarry, go into premature labour and experience long labour.

Combining the skills of doctors and midwives and scientists at Liverpool University, the centre hopes to pioneer new treatments. Dr Siobhan Quenby, consultant obstetrician at the Women's, who works for Liverpool University’s school of Reproductive and Developmental Medicine, said: “There is nothing like this in the world, we have the expertise of the hospital and scientist of the university which will makes this world leading.

“We’ve been trying to get this centre for years to discover why women have recurrent miscarriages.

“15% of pregnancies end in miscarriage, but it’s only when women have three in a row that we can look into their problems.”