England's Chief Inspector of Hospitals has rated Worcestershire Health and Care NHS Trust as Good following an inspection by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) carried out between 9 January and 1 March 2018.
The trust is now rated Good in all the key questions CQC asks – is the service safe, effective, caring, responsive and well-led. This represents an improvement since the previous inspection – report published in August 2016 - when CQC had rated the trust as Requires Improvement for being safe.
CQC’s Deputy Chief Inspector of Hospitals (and lead for mental health), Dr Paul Lelliott, said:
“On our return to Worcestershire Health and Care NHS Trust we found the trust had maintained standards and that further improvements had been made in relation to whether its services were safe.
“We found that the trust operated collaboratively, with executives and non-executive directors sharing responsibility and liability for decision-making. There was a holistic understanding of performance, which integrated people’s views with information on quality, operations and finances.
“The trust communicated well with patients, carers, staff and stakeholders and there was a culture of learning and research throughout. The trust board was very visible across all its services, understood the challenges to quality and sustainability and identified any actions required to address these.
“We found a number of outstanding areas of practice at the trust. Notably these were in community mental health teams for adults of working age, mental health crisis teams and place of safety, long stay rehabilitation wards, mental health wards for older people, community health inpatient services, and community health services for adults.
“But there were also some areas where the trust needed to make improvements. The trust could do more to reduce errors in the administration of medicines on some of its acute mental health wards and make better assessments of the mental capacity of patients in its community hospitals to inform decisions about for which patients should or should not attempt resuscitation.
“We have reported all our findings back to the trust and the trust board knows where further work is needed. We will continue to monitor progress at the trust and this will include further inspections.”
Full details of CQC’s inspection, its ratings for the trust, including a ratings grid, are given in the report published on our website.
Ends
For further information, please contact Regional Engagement Officer, Helen Gildersleeve, on 0191 233 3379.
Journalists wishing to speak to the press office outside of office hours can find out how to contact the team here.
Please note: the press office is unable to advise members of the public on health or social care matters. For general enquiries, please call 03000 61 61 61.
...we found the trust had maintained standards and that further improvements had been made in relation to whether its services were safe
Dr Paul Lelliott, Deputy Chief Inspector of Hospitals (and lead for mental health)