The Care Quality Commission
  • Hospital
  • Independent hospital

Meridian House

Overall: Inadequate read more about inspection ratings

Meridian House, Normanby Road, Scunthorpe, DN15 8QZ (01724) 500870

Provided and run by:
Trent Cliffs Private Healthcare Limited

All Inspections

During an assessment under our new approach

Meridian House is a private outpatient doctors’ consultation and treatment centre, seeing patients via referral or self-referral on a private basis and via health insurance. The hospital provides a range of elective surgery treatments for NHS and other funded (insured and self-pay) adults in a range of surgery specialties. At this inspection the registered manager responded positively to the concerns raised as part of the last inspection and suspension period. They have taken immediate actions and made significant improvements to the service. Incident reporting systems and process were robust and effective. Mandatory training was suitable for all staff and the service demonstrated that all staff were now compliant with no outstanding training requirements observed. Environmental and safety audits had been improved with appropriate oversight from management. We saw examples of these in practice and all were suitable and appropriate completed. The service had introduced a new RAG rated training matrix for safeguarding training to ensure that all staff completed the required level of training as determined by their role. We also saw improvements with in house safeguarding training. We saw that all appropriate risk assessments and policy were in place to reflect national guidance. We also noted that all policies had been recently reviewed. All environmental concerns raised previously had been addressed or changes were still being implemented at the time of inspection. We observed all equipment included hazardous chemicals were stored appropriately and securely. We saw improvements in governance systems and process relating to safe recruitment of staff. We saw improvements in the management and storage of medicines including controlled medicines. We saw a newly implemented process to maintain this improvement.

18 and 19 December 2023

During a routine inspection

We rated this service as inadequate because early in the inspection process we found numerous significant concerns and issued a Section 31 Letter of Intent and a further Notice of Decision to suspend the service was issued. These notices were in relation to the safe care and treatment of patients and the management and oversight of the service. Ratings limiters were therefore considered and applied.

Our rating of this location went down. We rated it as inadequate because:

  • The service did not always provide safe care. Staff did not always receive mandatory training and there was insufficient attention to safeguarding. The service did not always control infection risk well. Staff did not always assess, monitor or manage risks to people who use the service. Equipment was not always checked to ensure it was safe to use and medication was not managed safely. The service did not always recognise incidents and there was little evidence of learning following incidents.

  • The service was not always well-led. Leaders did not always have the capacity to lead effectively. Risk was not always managed and oversight in relation to governance processes was not always robust. Incidents were not always investigated. Policies were not always reviewed and actions plans in relation to poor audit outcomes were not always considered or developed. The service did not always operate effective procedures to evidence that all staff employed were fit and proper persons. The service did not always engage well with patients and the community.

However:

  • Post inspection, the provider demonstrated a willingness to improve.

28 June 2023

During an inspection looking at part of the service

Meridian House is a private outpatient doctors’ consultation and treatment centre, seeing patients via referral or self-referral on a private basis and via health insurance. The hospital provides a range of elective surgery treatments for NHS and other funded (insured and self-pay) adults in a range of surgery specialties.

At the time of the inspection, the service had a registered manager in post. The service comprised of 5 clinic rooms, a patient waiting area, 2 dedicated endoscopy rooms, an endoscopy preparation room and wait area. In addition, there was a surgical pre-assessment clinic, 2 operating theatres, 2 consent rooms, a 6 bedded dedicated recovery area and 10 individual en-suite room for overnight stays.

Following this inspection, we wrote to the registered manager to notify them of the serious concerns identified during the inspection. We invited them to send us an action plan, setting out how either they had already addressed each of the concerns identified above, or how they intend to address them immediately. We received a response in the form of an action plan.

18th May 2022

During a routine inspection

We rated it as good because:

  • The patient environments were safe, clean and well maintained. Consideration had been given to ensure the environment was accessible for those who may require reasonable adjustments.
  • The service always had enough staff. Managers ensured that these staff received training, and appraisal. The staff worked well together as a multidisciplinary team.
  • Patient records were complete, contemporaneous and included information in relation to discharge planning.
  • Staff planned patient discharge well and liaised with services that would provide aftercare. Patients lengths of stay were short.
  • Staff engaged in both clinical and non-clinical audit to evaluate the quality of care they provided.
  • Staff treated patients with compassion and kindness, respected their privacy and dignity, and understood their individual needs. They involved patients and families and carers in care decisions.
  • The service was well led, and the governance processes ensured that procedures ran smoothly.

However:

  • There were gaps within staff training records in relation to safeguarding adults and children.
  • Actions identified as a result of audits of the resuscitation trolley within theatres had not been completed, resulting in out of date medication remaining in situ.
  • The service had not established access to translation and singing services.

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.