King’s Lynn Queen Elizabeth Hospital leaves ‘Special Measures’
It has faced a torrid last two years or so but now Lynn’s Queen Elizabeth Hospital has finally got something good to shout about.
Today it was informed it was formally out of special measures imposed when a Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspection found it wanting.
The QEH, which is currently only kept open by the 500 props holding up its ‘concrete-cancer’ stricken roof, is desperately hoping that the Government will include it on a list of hospitals to be completely rebuilt, but still has much to do to completely satisfy the regulators.
But the final approval from the national NHS England/Improvement team at least formally allows it to exit the Recovery Support System (otherwise known as ‘Special Measures’).
QEH was recommended for exiting RSS following successful Care CQC inspections in December 2020 and January 2021.
In those the trust was rated ‘Good’ in three core areas – medicine, urgent and emergency care (including the emergency department), and critical care, as well as receiving a Good rating for being ‘well-led’.
This means that the trust is now rated good in three domains – caring, well-led, and effective, by the CQC.
The trust also received its first outstanding rating for well-led within critical care.
The trust was one of the first to be recommended to be lifted out segment four of the System Oversight Framework (SOF) following the CQC inspection but before the trust could formally exit it needed to be approved by the system regulator, NHS England / Improvement.
This has now happened with a letter confirming the trust’s transition to SOF 3, which means QEH no longer requires mandated intensive support from its regulator.
The inspection results released in February did find shortcomings, including that people could not always access the services when needed and waiting times from referral to treatment were not always in line with national standards;
Mandatory training was also below trust targets.
And inspectors said the trust must improve waiting times, carry out weekly checks on resuscitation equipment and ensure it is maintained and ensure patient records and medicines are stored and managed properly.
Caroline Shaw,, QEH chief executive, said: “I am thrilled that our regulator has formally confirmed the trust’s exit from the Recovery Support System following our recent CQC inspection.
“Their formal confirmation that the trust has made significant progress to allow us to exit the Recovery Support System is the next important step in our improvement journey.
“That said, we are in no way complacent and know there is still much to do as we enter the next phase of our improvement journey, whilst ensuring we continue to sustain and embed the changes we have made over the last three years.
“I hope alongside our recent CQC report that this gives confidence to our patients, their families and the local community that QEH is an organisation very much on the up where they can have confidence in and receive the very best care.
“I would like to thank our staff and the local community for their ongoing support – without which this would not have been possible and restate our determination to continue on our journey of improvement so that we can see QEH go from strength to strength and achieve our ambition to be the best rural district general hospital for patient and staff experience.”
A spokesperson from NHS England and Improvement in the East of England said: “We are pleased to see the trust’s transition out of the NHS’s recovery support programme, a programme designed to support organisations facing the toughest challenges.
“We will continue to work closely with them and support them as they continue to improve their services.”
