The Priory Hospital

BMI The Priory Hospital is operated by BMI Healthcare Limited. The hospital has 65 inpatient beds (Bournville, Dudley, Aston, ITU and Highbury) and 17 day-case beds (Highbury and Paediatric Unit). Facilities include five operating theatres, a six-bed intensive treatment unit, a dedicated oncology centre, cardiac catheterisation lab, and X-ray, outpatient and diagnostic facilities.

The hospital provides surgery, medical care, critical care, services for children and young people, and outpatients and diagnostic imaging.

We inspected this service using our comprehensive inspection methodology, however we did not inspect services for children and young people or outpatient services. We carried out unannounced inspections of the surgical and diagnostic imaging services on 14 and 15 May 2019 and medical care and critical care on 17 and 18 July 2019.

To get to the heart of patients’ experiences of care and treatment, we ask the same five questions of all services: are they safe, effective, caring, responsive to people's needs, and well-led? Where we have a legal duty to do so we rate services’ performance against each key question as outstanding, good, requires improvement or inadequate.

Throughout the inspection, we took account of what people told us and how the provider understood and complied with the Mental Capacity Act 2005.

The main service provided by this hospital was surgery. Where our findings on surgery – for example, management arrangements – also apply to other services, we do not repeat the information but cross-refer to the surgery service level.

Services we rate

Our rating of this hospital stayed the same. We rated it as Requires improvement overall.

We found areas of practice that require improvement:

• The service did not always provide mandatory training in key skills to all staff and make sure everyone completed it.

• The design, maintenance and use of facilities and premises was not always in line with national guidance.

• Staff did not always complete and update risk assessments for each patient and remove or minimise risks.

• Records were not always stored securely.

• In critical care staff showed a lack of understanding about the mental capacity act and deprivation of liberty safeguards. There was no set space for staff to record capacity concerns in patient notes.

• Managers did not always ensure staff followed up-to-date guidance in respect of diabetic foot care. In medical care, staff did not always support patients to make informed decisions about their care and treatment. They did not always know how to support patients who lacked capacity to make their own decisions or were experiencing mental ill health.

• In medical care and diagnostic imaging, staff did not always ensure patients privacy and dignity was respected and took account of their individual needs.

• The service did not always take into account patients’ individual needs and preferences. Staff did not always make reasonable adjustments to help patients access services.

• In critical care, patients and visitors may not know how to give feedback and raise concerns about care received.

• Leaders did not always operate effective governance processes throughout the service.

We found areas of good practice:

• Staff understood how to protect patients from abuse and the service worked well with other agencies to do so. Staff had training on how to recognise and report abuse and they knew how to apply it.

• The service had enough staff with the right qualifications, skills, training and experience to keep people safe from avoidable harm and to provide the right care and treatment. Managers regularly reviewed and adjusted staffing levels and skill mix, and gave bank and agency staff a full induction.

• Staff gave patients enough food and drink to meet their needs and improve their health. They used special feeding and hydration techniques when necessary.

• Staff assessed and monitored patients regularly to see if they were in pain and gave pain relief in a timely way. They supported those unable to communicate using suitable assessment tools and gave additional pain relief to ease pain.

• The service made sure staff were competent for their roles. Managers appraised staff’s work performance and held supervision meetings with them to provide support and development.

• Key services were available seven days a week to support timely patient care.

• Staff gave patients practical support and advice to lead healthier lives.

• Staff treated patients with compassion and kindness.

• People could access the service when they needed it and received the right care promptly. Waiting times from referral to treatment and arrangements to admit, treat and discharge patients were in line with national standards.

• Staff at all levels were clear about their roles and accountabilities and had regular opportunities to meet, discuss and learn from the performance of the service.

Following this inspection, we told the provider that it must take some actions to comply with the regulations and that it should make other improvements, even though a regulation had not been breached, to help the service improve.

We also issued the provider with four requirement notices. Details are at the end of the report.

Heidi Smoult

Deputy Chief Inspector of Hospitals