- SERVICE PROVIDER
Archived: Solent NHS Trust
This is an organisation that runs the health and social care services we inspect
Report from 27 March 2025 assessment
Contents
Ratings - Acute wards for adults of working age and psychiatric intensive care units
Our view of the service
Maple ward is a 10 bedded Psychiatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) based at the Orchards, operated by Solent NHS Trust.
We assessed all the quality statements under the safe and well-led domains. We last inspected this service in February 2019 and rated the service good. We rated Effective, Caring, Responsive and Well-led as good and Safe as requires improvement. At the last inspection we issued a requirement notice telling the trust that medication management needed to be safe for all patients. At this inspection we did not find any concerns.
We undertook this assessment following an incident on the ward that resulted in a safeguarding enquiry and the ward voluntarily closing to new admissions. We assessed Maple ward following the ward reopening to new admissions to look at the safety of the patients admitted to the ward.
At this inspection we found that the trust was always looking to improve patient safety and learn from any incidents that did happen. The staff team could recognise safeguarding concerns and knew what actions they must take to protect patients. The staff team had the skills needed to keep patients safe. The ward was a suitable environment to provide care to this patient group. There were good systems in place to safely manage medicines. Staff told us that ward managers and senior managers were visible and approachable. The ward had a governance structure that linked to the trust wide process.
Staff told us morale was low as they could not always transfer patients, who needed a higher level of security, quickly. Overseas staff members told us that more support adjusting to life in the United Kingdom, from the trust, would have been helpful.
People's experience of this service
We spoke with two patients admitted to Maple ward. Both felt they did not need to be at the service. Both felt the staff were caring but did not always help them with all their needs. For example, one patient told us that staff had not helped them attend a physical health appointment. We addressed this with staff who explain an appointment had been cancelled but another appointment had been made for later that week.