England’s Chief Inspector of Hospitals has found that East London NHS Foundation Trust has continued to maintain a high standard in the quality of services for patients.
A team of inspectors from the Care Quality Commission visited the trust in March and April 2018 to check the quality of three core mental health services – community mental health services for people with learning disabilities or autism; wards for people with learning disabilities or autism and forensic inpatient/secure wards. CQC also looked specifically at management and leadership to answer the key question: Is the trust well led?
The trust’s overall rating remains Outstanding. Consistent ratings were also maintained across all other key questions. CQC has rated the trust as Outstanding for being caring, responsive to people’s needs and well-led and as Good for being safe and effective.
Full details of the ratings are available online read the report
Inspectors found the trust had addressed most of the areas where improvements were needed from the last inspection in 2016 and had made particular improvement in the forensic inpatient/secure wards core service which is now rated Outstanding. One example of outstanding practice in this area involved staff supporting patients to live healthier lives by supporting them to be physically active, encouraging exercise and holding discussion groups with patients about healthy dietary choices. Patients and carers were consistently positive about the standard of care and told inspectors that staff always treated them with respect, kindness and dignity.
On the well-led review, CQC found a trust board that was dynamic, visionary and confident in performing its role and committed to ensuring that patients received the best care possible by fostering an open, no blame culture with a willingness to address any concerns raised and learn when things went wrong.
The involvement of patients and carers remained central to the work of the trust. Patients were supported to express their wishes and to be active participants in meetings where their care was discussed.
Dr Paul Lelliott, Deputy Chief Inspector of Hospitals (and lead for mental health), said:
“Since we last inspected services at East London NHS Foundation Trust in June 2016, the trust has continued to maintain consistently high standards in the quality of care to patients but also strived to embed further improvements. It is this commitment to continual improvement that is a fundamental characteristic of an Outstanding trust.
“Throughout our inspection we saw evidence of an organisation that operates an inclusive culture, committed to providing the best possible care for patients and a positive atmosphere where both patients and staff feel valued and able to contribute to decision making within the service. The strong and able leadership of the board has clearly allowed this culture to thrive.
“We have identified some areas for further improvement in relation to completion of mandatory staff training, staff supervision and ensuring reviews of patient deaths are conducted in good time. We expect the trust to continue to work on these areas identified on behalf of their patients”
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we saw evidence of an organisation that operates an inclusive culture, committed to providing the best possible care for patients
Dr Paul Lelliott, Deputy Chief Inspector of Hospitals (and lead for mental health)