Queensway Hospital Also known as Oak Tree Forest Limited

On this page

• Overview
• Kindness, compassion and dignity
• Treating people as individuals
• Independence, choice and control
• Responding to people’s immediate needs
• Workforce wellbeing and enablement

This meant people were supported and treated with dignity and respect; and involved as partners in their care.

Good: Staff treated patients with compassion and kindness. They respected patients’ privacy and dignity. They understood the individual needs of patients and supported patients to understand and manage their care, treatment or condition. Staff involved patients in care planning and risk assessment and actively sought their feedback on the quality of care provided. Staff informed and involved families and carers appropriately.

We have not awarded this service a score for Caring.

Find out about when we will not publish a key question score and what we look at when we assess Caring.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service always treated people with kindness, empathy and compassion and respected their privacy and dignity. Staff treated colleagues from other organisations with kindness and respect.

Staff attitudes and behaviours when interacting with patients showed that they were discreet, respectful and responsive, providing patients with help, emotional support and advice at the time they needed it. We received feedback from commissioners who said the hospital “continuously demonstrate empathy, compassion and respect to patients.”

Staff supported patients to understand and manage their care, treatment or condition.

Staff directed patients to other services when appropriate and, if required, supported them to access those services. For example, patients were also supported to attend appointments and one patient was supported to access a day centre.

Patients said staff treated them well and behaved appropriately towards them. Patients told us, “Healthcare Assistant’s in the majority are nice, caring and engage in therapeutic language” and “Staff are skilled and approachable”.

Staff understood the individual needs of patients, including their personal, cultural, social and religious needs.

Staff said they could raise concerns about disrespectful, discriminatory or abusive behaviour or attitudes towards patients without fear of the consequences.

Staff maintained the confidentiality of information about patients.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service treated people as individuals and made sure people’s care, support and treatment met people’s needs and preferences. They took account of people’s strengths, abilities, aspirations, culture and unique backgrounds and protected characteristics.

The service made adjustments for disabled patients – for example, by ensuring disabled people’s access to premises and by meeting patients’ specific communication needs.

Staff ensured that patients could obtain information on treatments, local services, patients’ rights, how to complain and so on.

The information provided was in a form accessible to the patient group for example, in easy-read form for people with a learning disability or autism. The hospital supported individual patients by completing autism care plans, the organisation had an autism lead and the hospital had an autism champion. Patients we spoke with spoke highly of the support provided by the autism lead, the “fortnightly autism lead is very good” and they told us “staff are autism aware. The care is tailored to needs” The hospital were completing an autism accreditation assessment submitted in May 2026.

Staff made information leaflets available in languages spoken by patients.

Managers ensured that staff and patients had easy access to interpreters and/or signers.

Patients had a choice of food to meet the dietary requirements of religious and ethnic groups and to account for allergies and intolerances.

Staff ensured that patients had access to appropriate spiritual support.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service promoted people’s independence, so people knew their rights and had choice and control over their own care, treatment and wellbeing.

During our inspection we spoke with 19 members of the team, including the hospital manager. The hospital supported an independent expert by experience role who held regular meetings with existing patients and the ex-patient group.

Patients told us that they were able to personalise their rooms and relatives we spoke with confirmed that they were able to visit their loved ones in their rooms at times when it was difficult for them to use the visitors room.

Two patients had their own designated lounge area, by utilising 2 other bedrooms, to support with transition to the hospital and individual needs. This was agreed at the point of admission as part of the bespoke package of care.

We reviewed 5 care and treatment records which included safety plans. Patients had hospital passports and communication passports. Staff we spoke with told us about enabling choice and control for patients and gave examples such as playing specific music during nasogastric feeds to lessen patients distress during this time. Staff spoke about the use of sensory items whilst patients were on leave to support needs and reduce distress.

In terms of maximizing a patient’s independence, choice and control. All patients completed a patient inclusion least restrictive management interventions and plans (PILRIMP) document. This was a patient led document completed by the patient and updated monthly by the nursing team. The document considered individual's preferences, preferred activities or items to enable both the staff team and patient to identify support options and proactive strategies. The document also identified support preferences prior to a restrictive intervention or ways to utilise these preferences during an intervention.

Staff we spoke with told us about positive progression for patients and gave several examples which were confirmed by relatives we spoke with. Examples included the successful transition of patients from child and adolescent mental health services and from more restrictive environments. Positive and proactive reduction of supportive observations and restrictive practice for patients.

The hospital also recognised that support for families was a key factor in developing supportive strategies and the hospital had access to a family therapist.

The staff spoke about awareness of and appropriately managing people’s individual needs, for example ensuring minimal rotation of different staff to support neurodiverse needs.

People were supported to maintain relationships with their family. All 5 relatives we spoke with told us that they visited and had regular contact with their loved ones. They found the hospital accommodating especially as some families had to travel a significant distance to visit their loved ones.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service listened to and understood people’s needs, views and wishes. Staff responded to people’s needs in the moment and acted to minimise any discomfort, concern or distress.

Staff were aware of and dealt with any specific risk issues, such as falls or pressure ulcers and care planned for these accordingly. The hospital monitored patient’s physical health by using recognised rating scales to assess and record severity and outcomes such as National Early Warning Score (NEWS), and to identify acute deterioration, including sepsis. At the time of inspection staff were 97% compliant with sepsis in health and social care training. People were referred to external services such as dentistry, neurology, district nurses and diabetes team, as required. 

The hospital spoke about good collaborative work with the GP and had a service level agreement in place with them (a contract between providers that define particular responsibilities). All patients were out of area and therefore registered with a local GP on admission. 

Staff used de-escalation techniques to reduce the need for physical interventions when patients’ behaviours became heightened. The hospital committed to reducing the use of restraint and restrictive practices and promoting human rights and person-centred approaches. The organisation was a certified organisation and Restraint Reduction Network approved. 100% of staff had completed the organisations restrictive interventions training.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service cared about and promoted the wellbeing of their staff, and supported and enabled staff to always deliver person-centred care.

Staff felt respected, supported and valued. Staff told us that they felt listened to, for example they told us the hospital supported staff with patients on high observation levels to ensure they had sufficient breaks and regular debriefs.

Staff felt positive and proud about working for the provider and their team.

Staff had access to support for their own physical and emotional health needs through an occupational health service. Staff we spoke with told us that the provider was understanding of their personal circumstances. The hospital had a reflective practice group supported by the psychologist and regular team meetings. Staff could use the multi-faith room within the hospital.

The provider recognised staff success within the service, for example, through compliments and recognition.

Staff appraisals included conversations about career development and how it could be supported.