Keogh Review panel say Grimsby's hospital now a 'different place'

GRIMSBY'S hospital is a "different place" to what it was in the summer, according to a team of inspectors who visited last week.

Karen Dunderdale, chief nurse at the trust which runs the hospital, said members of the Keogh review panel had been impressed by the commitment and pride of staff and were satisfied the hospital was making good progress.

She told a meeting of North East Lincolnshire Council's health scrutiny panel that the trust would not receive a report until after the visit of the chief inspector of hospitals Sir Mike Richards next year and therefore would remain in special measures until then.

However, she insisted that did not mean the trust was not meeting the conditions set down by the Keogh Review.

The Northern Lincolnshire and Goole NHS Foundation Trust (NLAG) was placed in special measures in July, following an investigation into higher than expected mortality rates.

The six-strong delegation went to both Grimsby and Scunthorpe hospitals during their visit.

Ms Dunderdale said: "The feedback that they gave us was incredibly positive.

"They could see that both of the two hospitals were different places to when they visited in June. They were very clear that our staff are more informed and that leadership is permeating through the organisation.

"They went to ward C5 at Grimsby and they were very impressed with what they saw and how the teams have galvanised, that patient flow is improving and that there's a lot of pride in the organisation."

Asked what was behind the discrepancy between the mortality indicators for the two hospitals, with Grimsby's significantly higher than Scunthorpe, her colleague Professor Carrick Sewell, said: "There's no single answer to that."

He added: "Clinical process has been a little bit different at the two hospitals. They are now getting to be the same. We can see an improvement at both sites and convergence so that Grimsby and Scunthorpe get the same values."

The pair were also asked about the decision by the North East Lincolnshire Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) not to allocate any of the government funding aimed at easing the strain on A&E departments during the winter directly to the trust.

Ms Dunderdale said: "The Department for Health has released a significant amount of money. How the commissioners chose to use that money is up to them.

"In North East Lincolnshire they are using that money on preventative schemes. I can understand why they want to do that and they will inform us how they are going to use that funding."