The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has rated the services provided by Blackpool Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust as Requires Improvement following an inspection in June.
At this latest inspection, the trust was rated Requires Improvement for safe, effective and responsive, Good for caring and Inadequate for well-led. Since their last inspection, December 2017, the overall trust rating has remained the same.
Some of the findings from the inspection include:
- Performance in medical care, including older people’s care at Blackpool Victoria Hospital had deteriorated and is now rated inadequate. Surgery and critical care had also deteriorated and is now rated as Requires Improvement.
- In addition, the overall rating for Fleetwood Hospital remained as Requires Improvement
- More positively, at the Clifton Hospital, the overall rating remained Good.
- Overall ratings for community health services remained as Good. Community health services for adults retained the rating of Outstanding. However, the ratings for child and adolescent mental health wards fell to Requires Improvement.
A full report on the inspection is available at: www.cqc.org.uk/provider/RXL
Ann Ford, Deputy Chief Inspector of Hospitals, said;
“It is disappointing that since the last inspection, Blackpool Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, had not made any significant improvement and in some areas performance had declined. In response, our rating of well led has deteriorated to Inadequate as we found that the inspection team found that not all leaders had the knowledge and capacity to lead some of the services and effectively implement change.
“In addition, leaders and teams did not use systems to manage performance effectively. They did not always identify and escalate relevant risks and issues and identify actions to reduce their impact. Risks and issues of concern were not always dealt with quickly enough.
“Leaders did not always operate effective governance processes throughout the services provided; staff did not always have regular opportunities to meet, discuss and learn from the performance of the service. Inspectors also commented on staffing levels and morale - the trust did not always have enough nursing, medical and allied health professional staff with the right qualifications, skills, training and experience to keep patients safe from avoidable harm and to provide the right care and treatment and staff did not always feel respected, supported and valued.”
Recently there has been significant change in the senior leadership team. Immediately prior to our inspection, the chief executive retired and there was a new interim chief executive who had been in post for five weeks at the time of the inspection. A number of additional new appointments have been made and the new leadership team must now urgently address the areas identified for improvement including:
- The trust must ensure that systems and processes are established and operated effectively to assess and monitor and improve the quality and safety of the services provided.
- The trust must ensure that care and treatment is provided in a safe way for patients and that their risks are assessed and that all is done to mitigate any such risks.
- The trust must ensure that the care and treatment of patients appropriate, meets their needs and reflects their preferences. The trust must ensure that it carries out an assessment of the needs for care and treatment and it designs care and treatment that meets those needs.
- The trust must ensure the trust deploys sufficient numbers of suitably qualified, competent, skilled and experienced staff to make sure they can meet people’s care and treatment needs.
As the safety of patients is paramount, CQC will be working closely with the trust and partner organisations until we are assured that the required improvements have been made.
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For further information please contact CQC Regional Engagement Manager David Fryer by email david.fryer@cqc.org.uk by phone on 07754 438750 or Mark Humphreys,mark.humphreys@cqc.org.uk and 0191 201 1675
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