A WARNING notice has been issued to Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust demanding ‘significant improvement’ following visits from health watchdog the Care Quality Commission.
Called a ‘Section 29A notice’ the CQC says it is expecting to see improvement by March 10, 2017.
The concerns relate to all three hospital sites – the Alexandra Hospital, Kidderminster Hospital, and Worcestershire Royal Hospital – and are targeted at patient safety.
The CQC says the systems, processes and the operation of the governance arrangements in place are not effective in terms of:
Identifying and mitigating risks to patients in relation to which significant improvement is required.
Providing assurance that actions are taken to improve safety and quality of patient care.
Concerns focus around:
1) Patient safety through the urgent care pathway
2) Quality governance systems in the organisation (how do you know patients are safe)
3) Compliance
Examples of concerns include mixed sex accommodation breaches; fridge temperatures; inappropriate care settings for patients; Lack of National Early Warning and Paediatric Early Warning scores recording; A&E waits and staffing.
Trust chair Caragh Merrick said she fully accepted the CQC’s concerns before telling staff: “We will deliver consistent high quality patient care, and patient safety. We know staff will be disappointed and we share the same focus as the CQC.
“We will refocus on the basics – in the past we have lost sight of these and have not always responded in a way that delivers improvements and learning.
“From the Ward to the Board we will strengthen processes to ensure patient safety, and refocus on the basic care standards.
“We must focus on patient safety, quality of care and delivery of professional standards that we can all be proud of.”
A spokesperson for the trust said: “We can confirm that a staff email was sent out at 2.30pm.
“We are arranging a series of staff briefings and also we are arranging a briefing for the local media tomorrow (Wednesday) where we will explain in full the trust’s response and improvement plan going forward.”
