NHS trust running mental health services in Norfolk and Suffolk no longer 'inadequate'
It's now rated as 'requires improvement'
Inspectors say the trust that runs mental health services in Norfolk and Suffolk has made improvements - and is no longer considered 'inadequate'.
The Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust was previously considered inadequate - after years of issues with staffing and patient care.
It was placed into special measures a few years ago.
Now, following an inspection last year, the Care Quality Commission (CQC) has upgraded Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust’s rating from inadequate to requires improvement.
CQC inspected six of the trust’s core services at the latest inspection:
• Child and adolescent mental health wards
• Community-based mental health services for working-age adults
• Long stay or rehabilitation mental health wards for working age adults
• Acute wards for adults of working age and psychiatric intensive care units
• Mental health crisis services and health-based places of safety
• Wards for older people with mental health problems.
As well as its overall rating improving following the latest inspection, the trust’s ratings for being safe, effective and well-led also improved from inadequate to requires improvement.
The trust was also, again, rated good for being caring, and, again, rated requires improvement for being responsive to people’s needs.
THE CQC also found there were a small number of areas where there's been a deterioration in the quality and safety of care provided to people.
To ensure improvement that has been made continues, the CQC has recommended the trust continues to receive intensive support from NHS England.
What does the trust say?
CEO of the trust Stuart Richardson says they have made mistakes - but are now focused on improvements: "What we've achieved over the last twelve months is a conversation about how we can all work together to learn from what's not happened in the past to make a change in a positive way, and, most importantly, make a change for patients...
"The hard work of the staff has had a considerable impact on our progress over the last year and it's really pleasing that that's been reflected in the CQC's ratings and report."
"It's made welcome progress"
Jane Ray, CQC deputy director of operations, said:
“While the trust has more to do to consistently provide high standards of care and treatment that people have a right to expect, it’s made welcome progress – even at what continues to be a difficult time for the NHS.
“Although our previous inspection found the trust’s care was very poor, we noted it had a more stable leadership team and board with the potential to drive improvement. This team needed time for its approach to deliver results, and our latest inspection found that improvements had been delivered at pace.
“This was particularly evident in the trust’s child and adolescent mental health wards, which had gone through a transformation programme. This included improving the physical environment and strengthening clinical leadership across the unit.
“Staff morale in the service was good, and young people using it described the unit as a safe environment where staff met their needs in a caring way."
More work to be done
Jane acknowledged more must be done by the trust, though:
the trust hadn’t shown improvement in all areas, and there were some aspects of its care where quality and safety had deteriorated.
“This includes a few acute mental health wards and its wards for older people with mental health problems, where there continued to be ligature points – despite us previously telling the trust it needed to address these. However, there were plans for them to be removed.
“We also found some wards didn’t have enough staff who had completed mandatory training, and a few staff weren’t carrying out restrictive interventions – such as restraint or seclusion – appropriately. However, the trust was addressing these issues.
“This demonstrated that although changes to improve people’s safety had been introduced at pace by the trust since the last inspection, further refinement and embedding is needed to improve the consistency of its care."