Kettering General Hospital NHS Trust placed in special measures

Kettering General Hospital NHS Foundation Trust has been placed in special measures after the Care Quality Commission (CQC) found services at the hospital were inadequate and safety ‘not a sufficient priority’.

In a statement, Professor Sir Mike Richards, CQC’s chief inspector of hospitals, said: “We found a number of serious problems when we inspected the services run by Kettering General Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and I have made a recommendation to NHS Improvement that the trust should be placed into special measures."

“We made NHS Improvement aware of our concerns following the inspection and it has begun to work with the trust to make sure these are appropriately addressed and that progress is monitored.

“One of the reasons we rated the trust as Inadequate for being well-led and safe was because risks to patients were not always identified and when they were identified, there was a lack of adequate management of these. In addition, there was a lack of learning from incidents to prevent patient harm. This was particularly the case in the emergency department, outpatients and services for children and young people."

Richards maintained: “My inspection team found that the majority of staff were hard working, passionate and caring but had to struggle against the pressures they faced. We found that staff treated patients with dignity and respect which is why we rated the trust as Good for being caring.
Good practice was noted across critical care and end of life care services in particular."

Responding to the report, Leanne Hackshall, Kettering General Hospital’s director of Nursing and Quality, said: “We have an improvement plan underway which is addressing the areas highlighted by the CQC. Some actions are already complete and others are in process. Clearly it will take some time to address all of the issues listed in the report and bring them up to standard.”

“Some examples of key improvements we have already made to improve safety and quality are increased staffing levels, improved training programmes, and changes to the hospital’s estate and security arrangements to keep patients safe.”