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Blast for Leeds hospital staff shortages
Staff shortages are putting patients at risk at a Leeds hospital.
St James’s Hospital has been criticised by an NHS watchdog over staffing levels for the second time in five months.
Inspectors visited in December because of concerns over poor care, including claims that a dementia patient had gone missing because of a lack of supervision.
One ward was found to be understaffed for nearly half of all shifts.
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has now ordered further improvements.
Its report said: “These staff shortages have not resulted in significant harm to patients. However, the risks to patients are heightened when these wards are routinely functioning understaffed.”
A team from the CQC visited St James’s in December following reports of “poor care and neglect of people’s needs” from patients and staff.
Concerns included:
* Leaving patients in wet beds;
* Patients falling because of a lack of supervision;
* Elderly people seen wandering wards while undressed;
* Long waits for patients on trolleys in corridors;
* Staff not available to assist people in getting to the toilet or to change soiled bedding.
The inspectors said patients on the three wards - which mainly look after elderly people - received appropriate care and staff were kind and considerate.
But they added: “However, it is evident from staff and patient comments that there is sometimes a shortage of staff and that this can impact on people’s care, the likelihood of patients slipping and falling, discharge planning, and on occasion their dignity can be compromised as a result.”
One worker said patients were missing physiotherapy appointments because they were not washed and dressed in time.
Problems with discharge planning meant patients could wait up to seven hours on a trolley for a bed.
As reported in the Yorkshire Evening Post, an inspection last summer found there were often not enough staff and hospital bosses took action.
But during the latest visit rotas showed on one ward, 46 per cent of shifts were down by at least one worker.
The inspectors said: “There are often times on wards 28, 29 and 34 when there are insufficient staff, and it is difficult to get more staff quickly, to provide care that is always safe, effective and meets people’s needs.”
Maggie Boyle, chief executive at Leeds Teaching Hospitals, told a meeting of directors they were taking the concerns very seriously.
“The view is that anything that compromises patient care is not to be tolerated in the organisation. We have to be very robust in our response to this.”
In a statement chief nurse Ruth Holt said: “Some of the individual comments from staff on the wards about staffing levels picked up in the report are concerning. Considerable work has already been done and progress has been made - including additional funding which was made available for staffing in elderly care - however we acknowledge that changes do take time to feed through.”
She said the report noted improvements since the previous visit.
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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Comments
There are 8 comments to this article
Page 1 of 1
kiaceed09
Saturday, February 18, 2012 at 07:35 PMMy mum was recently at st james and i never received any info on how she was doing at all, even when it came to discharging her i wasnt consulted and guess what a week later she was back in hospital again. You go on the wards there and your are lucky if you can find a nurse to speak to , its a disgrace. Whilst you are visiting not one staff comes into she that patient but in huddersfield royal infirmary you are unindated with staff and info.St james sort yourself out soon.
Healthworker2012
Monday, February 13, 2012 at 06:56 PMIf you think this is just a problem on the wards its not, its across the trust, admin and clerical staff have been frozen for the last 3 years at least! When someone leaves, no one ever replaces them leaving more and more work for the already massively overworked admin staff. Being able to provide efficient administration and diagnostics is as essential to a hospital as nurses are to wards but every time applications are sent for approval they are rejected......the trust is desperate to save 55 million to achieve its foundation status and something has to give, some of these pointless managers should go if you ask me. This is before all the new changes come in by the Tories.....can you imagine what it will be like when all that gets pushed through.....total chaos!
whirlygig
Sunday, February 12, 2012 at 04:38 PMHow common is the practice of patients receiving some treatmnet at Jimmys, but then being sent to LGI for it to be completed? I was in LGI last week and three of those waiting had been at Jimmys at lunchtime and at 7pm were still waiting to be seen at LGI. All were broken bones and were being treat by a doctor who was also covering A&E. The walk from Clarendon to A&E takes about 5 minutes, so every return trip is 10 minutes wasted.
frustrated nurse
Sunday, February 12, 2012 at 01:29 PMI am glad that this article is in the evening post and the full CQC report makes interesting reading. Poor nursing care should not be tolerated. I hope this situation improves soon. If not good nurses who want to give the best care will eventually become so disillusioned they will just leave the profession and that would be such a waste.
Nigel B
Sunday, February 12, 2012 at 09:26 AMIts not the funding of the NHS that is causing problems, its all the changes and managing that change. The funding has increased by over £2 billion this year. Funding for building work has been reduced by £34 billion, funding in other areas has increased by just over £2 billion.
ken2
Sunday, February 12, 2012 at 01:11 AMCameron said the NHS would be protected, liar deceiver ! ask anyone who works for the NHS and they will tell you of wards closing, services being axed and as people leave they are not replaced. Less and less people are expected to carry out the same amount of work which of course results in an inferior service to patients. Its all being slimmed down ready to be sold off to Cameron's rich business friends who finance his party. Never forget the Tories could not get away with this if it wasn't for the so called Liberals propping them up and keeping them in power.
chezanya
Saturday, February 11, 2012 at 11:13 PMThe nhs has gone mad... my mum.. who has dementia.. was told.. on her own she has cancer...the staff at the LGI.. didnt think to tell us....so when mum is saying,, u do know i have cancer... we are saying... dont be silly mum...and all the time she had... but the idiots at LGI did not tell her carers...poor mum... now me and my brother feel terrible... as we didnt know cos the half wits at LGI didnt tell us... i hope they sleep well ....they also neglected my daughters dad...sent him home... yes he died... i have a lump in my breast i have to go there ... i think i will go to wilsons butchers... i fancy my chances there
decolyn
Saturday, February 11, 2012 at 10:14 AMall this is because the government insist on cutbacks from services,, if your wealthy you can afford private for the rest of us we are at the mercy of the government and their brainless ideas for saving money..it seems that when your old or no longer able to contribute your on the scrap heap. i have seen trolley's lined up with elderly people on them, on the corridors at a Leeds hospital. one poor chap was calling out that he needed a drink and no one was taking any notice of him. my daughter went to him to speak to him, the poor chaps aid he had been there hours and he wanted a drink ant to go to the toilet after chasing up a member of staff someone was assigned to take him to the toilet. i dont know what happened to him because i had to go for an x ray but i expect the staff are overworked, have too many deadlines and targets to meet to actually have much time to do actual nursing. what a state of affairs and its only going to get worse!!!!
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