Plymouth Hospitals Trust's risk level assessed in new healthcare watchdog report

A new report into Plymouth Hospitals Trust has indicated that it is at a moderately low level of risk of failing to provide safe, effective, caring, responsive and well-led services. 

The healthcare watchdog, the Care Quality Commission (CQC), has published a new 'Intelligent Monitoring Report' for each of the 161 acute and mental health trusts in England.

The CQC has categorised Trusts into one of six summary bands, with band 1 representing those with the highest risk and band 6, those with the lowest. These bands have been assigned based on the proportion of indicators that have been identified as ‘risk’ or ‘elevated risk’.

The assessment of Plymouth's hospitals, including the flagship Derriford Hospital, has placed the Trust in band 4, towards the lower end of the risk tables, though the report identified four of a total of 85 indicators as being at 'risk' and one as being at 'elevated risk'.

Trusts where there are known serious concerns (e.g. those in special measures) are categorised as band 1.

The report has been greeted as broadly "good news" by Plymouth Hospitals Trust which has endured a testing time over the last few months: The Trust was recently rated as being below average in all four categories in a patient survey report by the Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC); and the CQC only recently lifted a formal warning it handed out after an investigation in April into eight serious patient safety incidents at the flagship hospital over a 12-month period. The Trust was told to "make urgent improvements to protect patients undergoing surgery" but a later re-inspection found that surgical safety had considerably improved.

Ann James, Chief Executive of Plymouth Hospitals Trust, said: “This is obviously good news for us and although risks have been identified, our risk has been identified as being at a lower level. We have many achievements to be proud of and some challenges we are addressing. We believe we are providing safe, effective, caring and responsive care and it is good to see the report, while identifying some risks, reflects that belief.”