Chief Inspector of Hospitals rates Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust as ‘Good’

England’s Chief Inspector of Hospitals has rated the services provided by Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust as ‘Good’ following an inspection by the Care Quality Commission in May.

The CQC inspected the core services provided by Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust for four days. The trust provides mental health, learning disability, substance misuse and health and social care services for adults of working age, older adults, children and adolescents across Cambridgeshire.

A team of inspectors, which included a variety of specialists and experts by experience, visited hospital wards and community based mental health services. Full reports including ratings for all of the provider’s core services are available at: www.cqc.org.uk/provider/RT1. 

Inspectors rated the services provided by staff to be ‘Good’ regarding whether they were effective, caring, responsive and well-led and rated them as ‘Requires Improvement’ regarding whether services were safe.

CQC’s Deputy Chief Inspector of Hospitals (and lead for mental health), Dr Paul Lelliott, said:

“Overall, Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust provides good care to the large population that it serves. The trust can be proud of many of the services that it manages.

“We found staff to be dedicated, kind, caring and patient focused. We were told by patients that staff respected their personal, cultural and religious needs and inspectors saw some very good examples of the trust delivering services in line with peoples’ cultural needs.

“The executive team impressed us both individually and collectively. Good governance arrangements were in place and the team worked hard to improve and enhance the quality of care provided to those who use services.

“The trust is a large organisation and we found some services where improvements must be made. The trust has told us they have listened to our inspectors’ findings and we are confident that the executive team, with the support of their staff, will work to deliver these improvements on behalf of all of their patients. We will return in due course to check on the progress that they have made.”

The reports highlight several areas of good practice, including:

• Services were effective, responsive and caring. Where concerns had arisen the board had taken urgent action to address areas of improvement.
• Staff treated people who used the service with respect, listened to them and were compassionate. They showed a good understanding of people’s individual needs.
• The board and senior management had a vision with strategic objectives in place and staff felt engaged in the improvement agenda of the trust. Performance improvement tools and governance structures were in place and had brought about improvement to practices.
• Morale was found to be good in most areas and staff felt supported by local and senior management. There was effective team working and staff felt supported by this.
• Arrangements were in place to ensure effective use of the Mental Health Act and Mental Capacity Act.
• Medicines management was effective and pharmacy was embedded into ward practice.

Inspectors said that the trust must improve in some areas, including:

• The trust must review systems relating to the monitoring of the administration of, and adherence with, the Mental Health Act 1983, and associated Code of Practice, specifically in relation to consent to treatment and practices amounting to seclusion.
• The trust must ensure staffing issues are addressed in some community children’s teams and acute services.
• The trust must ensure that within inpatient services ligature risks are removed or fully managed and that observation is improved in some areas.

Full reports for the trust and all core services will be published on CQC’s website today at the following link: www.cqc.org.uk/provider/RT1.

Ends

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