We carried out a review of the data available to us about The Wellington Hospital Elstree Waterfront on 6 July 2023. We have not found evidence that we need to carry out an inspection or reassess our rating at this stage.
This could change at any time if we receive new information. We will continue to monitor data about this service.
If you have concerns about The Wellington Hospital Elstree Waterfront, you can give feedback on this service.
Our rating of this location improved. We rated it as outstanding because:
Elstree Waterfront Outpatients and Diagnostic Centre is operated by HCA Healthcare UK. The service was registered with the CQC in June 2017. The service provides outpatient services and diagnostic imaging including X-ray ultrasound and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).
The service provides outpatient clinics and diagnostic imaging facilities for adults and children. During our inspection, we visited all services within the service. Services included outpatient appointments for preoperative and postoperative review, as well as outpatient treatments such as naso-endoscope and dermatology procedures. In the reporting period of May 2018 to April 2019, there were 7,091 outpatient attendances and 2,448 diagnostic imaging procedures completed. The outpatient appointments were a combination of patients accessing treatment and surgical outpatient consultations.
We inspected this service using our comprehensive inspection methodology. We carried out a short notice announced inspection on 18 June 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 outpatients. Where our findings on outpatients – for example, management arrangements – also apply to other services, we do not repeat the information but cross-refer to the outpatient service level.
Services we rate
We have not previously rated this service. At this inspection in June 2019, we rated this service as Good overall.
We found the following areas of good practice:
The design, maintenance and use of facilities, premises and equipment kept people safe. Staff were trained to use them.
The service had enough staff with the right qualifications, skills, training and experience to keep patients safe from avoidable harm and to provide the right care and treatment.
The service managed patient safety incidents well. Staff recognised incidents and reported them appropriately. Managers investigated incidents and shared lessons learned with the whole team and the wider service.
The service made sure staff were competent for their roles. Managers appraised staff’s work performance and held meetings with them to provide support and development.
Healthcare professionals including radiographers, radiologists, nursing staff and consultants worked together as a team to benefit patients. They supported each other to provide good care.
Staff treated patients with compassion and kindness, respected their privacy and dignity, and took account of their individual needs.
The service had managers at all levels with the right skills and abilities to run a service providing high-quality sustainable care.
The service planned and provided integrated person-centred care in a way that was flexible, provided informed choice and met the needs of local people and the communities served. It also worked with others in the wider system and local organisations to plan care.
The service took a proactive and inclusive approach to understand and take account of patients’ individual needs and preferences. There were innovative approaches to provide person-centred care, and staff made reasonable adjustments to help patients access services. They coordinated care with other services and providers.
The service improved service quality and safeguarded high standards of care.
Following this inspection, we told the provider that it should make improvements, even though a regulation had not been breached, to help the service improve. Details are at the end of the report.