Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust rating upgraded to Good after Care Quality Commission inspection shows improvement

England’s Chief Inspector of Hospitals has upgraded the rating of Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust from Requires Improvement to Good following a comprehensive inspection by the CQC in September 2016.

During this inspection, the team looked at 13 core services, including nine which needed improvements at the time of their last inspection in November 2015.

Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust provides in inpatient and community mental health services. It also provides forensic and secure services including prison healthcare in addition to inpatient and community health and wellbeing services for a population of around 1.4 million people.

The full report including ratings for all of the provider’s core services is available on this website.

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

“In April 2015, we found that the quality of some services provided by Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust to be requiring improvement and told them where they must make changes.  Some of the trust’s problems stemmed from staffing issues.

“Despite these challenges, the trust staff have shown a real determination to follow up the issues we had identified and they have made improvements across most areas of the trust. On this inspection, we found that they had a clearer sense of direction and was now more responsive to the needs of people using the service. They worked closely with other healthcare partners to identify those needs.

“We were particularly impressed by the work of the staff training and quality academy which is responsible for providing and monitoring all aspects of staff training and development. There is no doubt that this is improving the quality of patient care.

“We were impressed with the improvements we saw, and Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust should be proud of their new Good rating.”

Inspectors noted a number of improvements in areas that included:

• Arrangements for children and young people transitioning to adult mental health services had improved since the last inspection.
• The trust had developed a specific sexual health training module focusing on the needs of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transsexual patients.
• The forensic service had established a gardening project within the hospital grounds called “grow your own”. The project was available to local schools and community groups as well as patients and staff. Staff had developed practical guides to treatment pathways for patients within early intervention services which had been published as good practice.
• The care home support service team had reduced unnecessary admissions to hospital by implemented a ‘hydration kit’ for which they had been nominated for a national award.
• The trust had developed a ‘safer wandering scheme’ and protocol for people with dementia in partnership with the police.

Some of the areas where the CQC has told the trust it must make further improvements:

• All staff must receive the training they require to carry out their role.
• The trust must ensure the physical environment of one of the psychiatric intensive care wards is safe.
• The specialist community mental health services for children and young people must ensure all patients have a risk assessment.

Ends

For further information, please contact CQC Regional Communications Officer Kerri James by email at kerri.james@cqc.org.uk or by phone on 07464 92 9966.

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