The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has rated a children’s ward at Kettering General Hospital (KGH) inadequate.
The inspectors were concerned over sepsis treatment, staff numbers, dirt levels and not having an “open culture” where concerns could be raised without fear. There were previous reports that the ward may have to close as a result. See our previous blog here.
The latest concerns follow multiple previous accusations that the ward was failing children.
In February, the BBC reported concerns raised by parents of children who died or became seriously ill at KGH. Since then, the BBC says that dozens more families have come forward.
The CQC previously inspected Skylark ward and the neonatal unit back in December after hearing of concerns regarding safety.
Their inspection found that “staff did not always effectively identify and quickly act upon patients at risk of deterioration”. Inspectors said that there were sometimes delays in medical reviews being undertaken outside of working hours.
CQC Deputy Director of operations in the Midlands, Charlotte Rudge, said that inspectors found:
“the trust had ineffective systems in place to assess and treat people at risk of sepsis…”
“We were informed of an incident where someone who developed sepsis hadn’t had a sepsis screen for over seven hours after arrival at the hospital, which is totally unacceptable.”
Other findings of the inspection included:
- Inspectors were concerned about the potential risk of missing a child who needed to be safeguarded because records did not correlate.
- Wards were not always clean, including a “significant amount of brown dirt” on bathroom doors, dirt in shower areas and behind toilets, and dust on cot rails.
- There were not enough nursing or medical staff. Key nursing leadership positions were vacant.
In addition, the CQC reported that some issues which had previously been raised by them with KGH still remained, including concerns relating to paediatric life support training levels.
Inspectors said:
“Leaders did not have a robust oversight of the service at the time of our inspection to ensure the service was being effectively managed. We found limited progress had been made to improve the safety of the service.”
The CQC rated the service as “inadequate” and issued a warning notice to make improvements to multiple areas.
As part of the inspection, the CQC also visited the paediatric emergency department. That service was rated as requiring improvement.
Comment
KGH clearly has a lot of work to do. The CQC’s findings are deeply troubling, particularly as it seems previous warnings and issues highlighted have not been improved.
Families have the right to be assured that their children are receiving the best possible care when they are admitted to hospital, and it is obviously going to cause a lot of fear and concern in terms of the standard of care at KGH.
The hospital says that they have put immediate plans into action, but it will need to be subject to close scrutiny following the failure to follow-through with improvements previously.
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Danielle Young is a Legal Director in our Medical Negligence team, which has been ranked in tier one by the independently researched publication, The Legal 500.
If you have any questions in relation to the subjects discussed in this article, then please get in touch with Danielle or another member of the team in Derby, Leicester, or Nottingham on 0800 024 1976 or via our online form.
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