‘Lack of care’ in Croydon Hospital

Croydon University Hospital Pic: Croydon Health services

Croydon University Hospital has been graded ‘requires improvements on all the main and important categories’, according to a report.

Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspectors visited the hospital and found worrying results on the lack of care the patients received.  

The Commission, the independent regulator of health and social care services in England, found cases where patients’ records were not completed, and some patients were placed in areas of the hospital, which were not necessarily best for their treatment.

The most concerning finding was that the hospital needs to review its security arrangements to ensure a safe environment for both staff and patients. The report also indicated a lack of privacy for patients and some members of the staff had not completed their mandatory training.

The report was published after CQC inspectors visited the University hospital in October 2019 and rated the hospital with the same rating they had given the hospital on a previous visit in 2018.  In that year the hospital was found to require improvements in all main categories. According the latest report, the hospital did not follow up as required and some categories even got worse. The urgent and emergency care dropped from ‘good’ to ‘requires improvements’.

Chief Executive Matthew Kershaw & leader for Health at Croydon Health services, said:

“We are already taking action to address these, including a sustained recruitment drive both in the UK and overseas to improve our staffing levels, which has resulted in more than 100 new doctors and nurses joining the Trust since the inspection in October. We also have taken immediate action to tighten governance processes within some of our services.”

He apologized for not reaching the required standards, saying:

“We are sorry that we’ve fallen short of some of the standards that the CQC and local people should expect of us. This includes the length of time that our patients waited in our emergency department, robust auditing of some quality standards and the level of care that some of our patients received, as highlighted in our recent inpatient survey.”

However, the report also recognizes the University Hospital has reached required stands in equipment maintenance and hygiene in examined areas.

The hospital confirmed they wanted to improve standards, as expected by the CQC and patients, by strengthening their leadership. New roles will be put in place to give more support to teams on the ground and give clinical leaders greater control in the daily running of their services, the hospital said.

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