Sandwell health trust to take on more staff following damning report

Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust, which runs the hospital, 'requires improvement' according to inspectors from the Care Quality Commission.

The trust was told that the safety of services, including surgery and the outpatients department, at Sandwell were 'inadequate'

The trust, which also runs City Hospital in Birmingham, has been holding discussions with staff over a potential loss of 1,400 job losses over a five-year period.

But the CQC report said any drive to improve safety was 'potentially at cross purposes' with the proposed job cuts.

Toby Lewis, chief executive of Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust, said they needed more A&E consultants and nurses but staffing levels were safe.

He said: "We reviewed our nurse staffing levels last autumn and are absolutely confident that they meet or now exceed national safe staffing guidelines.

"We know we have more to do to fill our vacancies and cut staff sickness so that we have full teams consistently in place.

"We have cut agency use by a third and improved retention rates in our medical wards.

"We have great, caring staff and want them to have time to care. We keep our staffing levels under continual review to ensure we keep delivering safe care."

The report highlighted failings in hand washing to prevent the spread of infections, while there were other examples of medications not being locked away in cabinets.

Staff also failed to make adequate notes on patients' records, meaning important information was not passed on, such as what they had eaten for breakfast.

Mr Lewis said with the note taking, it was often the case that the action had been completed correctly, but a record of it had not been kept.

He added: "The report is very clear that there is room for improvement and the kind of things the report invites us to focus on even more is hand washing, making sure that the care we provide is more accurately reflected in notes and the security of medicines.

"So in responding to the report, we published our improvement plan that focuses on actions we have already taken, actions we will complete by June and actions that will take us until October to address."

Colin Ovington, the trust's chief nurse, said one of the unlocked drugs cabinets was behind a nurse station and the other was in a locked room, rendering them inaccessible to patients.

In particular, staff would be given more training to ensure there was not a repeat of the safety concerns, though he said at no point was the welfare of any patients endangered by the failings.

A&E, medical care, surgery and children and young people's services were also rated as 'requires improvement.'

But inspectors did highlight that critical care and end of life care were rated as 'good' with both staff and patients feeling well supported.

There said services within the community and the diabetic service were outstanding and had received national recognition.