The health service “stands on a burning platform” of an outdated model of acute care that is no longer able to deliver the services needed for modern patients, according to England’s top hospital inspector.
Prof Sir Mike Richards, the Care Quality Commission’s chief inspector of hospitals, said safety remains a “real concern” in the NHS, with wide variations of quality between hospitals and even between services within the same hospitals.
Remarking on the first round of inspections of England’s 136 acute non-specialist trusts and 18 specialist trusts, carried out between 2014-16, he said inspectors had uncovered pockets of “very poor care” in otherwise good hospitals.
“The scale of the challenge that hospitals are now facing is unprecedented,” Richards said. “Rising demand coupled with economic pressures are creating difficult-to-manage situations that are putting patient care at risk.
“During winter 2016-17, hospitals have faced ever-increasing demand for urgent and emergency services and the continuing challenges of delays in discharging patients to community and social care services.”
Richards’s comments come just a month after the British Red Cross said the NHS was facing a humanitarian crisis as hospitals and ambulance services struggled to keep pace with rising demand. In December, 50 of England’s 152 acute hospital trusts were forced to declare an alert because they could not cope.
According to the CQC’s state of hospitals report, published on Thursday, 81% of the 136 non-specialist trusts were deemed to be inadequate or to require improvement for safety, while 11% of hospital trusts were given the lowest rating for safety. None received a rating of outstanding in this area.
Urgent and emergency services and medical care had more ratings of inadequate and requires improvement than good or outstanding, which the report said reflected the fact many A&E services were struggling to cope with increasing numbers of patients.
The CQC introduced an inspection programme in 2013 after the public inquiry into the care scandal at Mid Staffordshire NHS foundation trust. Despite misgivings, its report applauded staff for their caring attitudes to patients, with no hospital trust given the lowest rating for providing a caring atmosphere for patients.
Opponents of healthcare privatisation and the government’s austerity agenda said the deficiencies highlighted by the CQC showed the impact of deep cuts to NHS services. “This should surprise no one and anger us all,” said Alan Taman, campaign manager for Keep Our NHS Public and Doctors for the NHS.
“How many years of cuts, cloaked in the coy term ‘efficiency savings’ did the government think it would take to put lives at serious risk? And how many lives will be taken before the truth is faced?” Taman said plans to close more hospitals and further slash staff would push more patients into costly private healthcare.
“The NHS is about fairness, about removing fear, about all of us giving the best to those that need it the most,” he said. “The fact that it has been deliberately run down and crippled like this is unfair, unjust and increasingly unsafe. The callous indifference of this government to heed an equally lengthening queue of informed, alarmed and angry people and blame anyone but themselves is the height of irresponsibility.
“People should join us in London this Saturday 4 March, to let this government know: we shall not let you destroy our NHS without a fight.”
A Department of Health spokesperson said: “As the report shows, hard-working NHS staff continue to make improvements for patients at a time of significant pressure, and we want to continue that throughout the country.”
NHS "standing on burning platform" of outdated acute care model
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