Hospital trusts celebrate top patient marks

Standards across Calderstones Partnership NHS Foundation Trust and the East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust were judged to be above the national average for cleanliness, food quality, privacy, dignity and maintenance.

Expert assessors from the Patient Led Assessments of the Care Environment looked at every detail of the Calderstones’ wards and houses as part of their annual study.

Community representatives, service users and Healthwatch Lancashire were among those checking scores about everything from whether crockery matched, if the right kind of carpet is being used and if guests’ privacy and dignity is respected.

This year’s scores at Calderstones show an encouraging upward trend for the Trust, with the majority of the scores in the high 90% range – above the national average.

The Trust’s scores were as follows: cleanliness (98%) food (96%) privacy, dignity and wellbeing (95%) condition, appearance and maintenance (94%).

The ELHT’s overall cleanliness rating rose to 96.47%, a significant increase on the previous year’s score of 91.68%.

East Lancashire Hospital’s PLACE rating also saw increases in Condition, Appearance and Maintenance (90.43%) and Dementia Friendly, which scored 85.07% compared to national average of 74.51%.

The Trust’s food was rated highly across all its sites, although the overall score was below the national average due to issues on the day at the Royal Blackburn Hospital.

These issues included the temperature of the food at the point of service and the fact that the Trust’s food and drink strategy is still in the developmental stages.

The issues related to temperature of food during the audit were immediately rectified.

Kevin McGee, Chief Executive, said: “East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust recognises our responsibility to provide the highest level of care possible for our patients in all areas.

“These assessments have shown patients do receive good care whilst they are with us but they have also highlighted some of the areas we’d like to improve on for next year’s assessments.

“The Trust has done brilliantly to ensure that its dementia friendly, achieving well above the national average and this is something to be immensely proud of.’’

PLACE assessments take place across the country and see local people go into hospitals to assess how the environment supports patient’s privacy and dignity, food, cleanliness and general building maintenance.