South Bristol NHS Community Hospital

On this page

• Overview
• Assessing needs
• Delivering evidence-based care and treatment
• How staff, teams and services work together
• Supporting people to live healthier lives
• Monitoring and improving outcomes
• Consent to care and treatment

We looked for evidence people and communities had the best possible outcomes because their needs were assessed. We checked people’s care, support and treatment reflected these needs and any protected equality characteristics, ensuring people were at the centre of their care. We also looked for evidence leaders instilled a culture of improvement, where understanding current outcomes and exploring best practice was part of their everyday work.

At our last assessment this key question was not rated. At this assessment we rated it as good.

This meant people’s outcomes were consistently good, and people’s feedback confirmed this.

We have not awarded this service a score for Effective.

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

The evidence showed a good standard. The service made sure people’s care and treatment was effective by assessing and reviewing their health, care, wellbeing and communication needs with them.

The service thoroughly assessed and reviewed patients’ health, care, wellbeing and communication needs with them.

Staff completed care records accurately. We reviewed 6 care records which showed accurate and complete information about the care and treatment people received. Staff used a range of tools to assess and review people’s care and treatment needs.

Staff were knowledgeable about the service user group they provided care for. Staff felt processes enabled them to respond to people’s changing needs. The manager gave an example where reception had raised concerns regarding a patient’s health. Nursing staff conducted an assessment and called 999 for urgent treatment and transfer.

The service had processes to book interpreters if the person required communication support during appointments.

A daily morning meeting by the nursing team prior to the commencement of clinics reviewed the additional needs of some of the patients who were attending.

The evidence showed a good standard. The service planned and delivered people’s care and treatment with them, including what was important and mattered to them. They did this in line with legislation and current evidence-based good practice and standards.

Staff followed policies to plan and deliver care and treatment according to best practice and national guidance. Policies were developed and reviewed centrally by the provider and were easily accessible through the hospital’s system.

Staff were experienced and qualified and had the right skills and knowledge to meet the needs of the patient group. Staff were able to remain supernumerary whilst developing specialist skills until they felt confident in the task they were completing.

Staff assessed and met patients’ needs for food and drink and for specialist nutrition and hydration.

The evidence showed a good standard. The service worked well across teams and services to support people. They made sure people only needed to tell their story once by sharing their assessment of needs when people moved between different services.

Staff had access to the information they needed to assess, plan and deliver patients’ care, treatment and support. Staff worked alongside the teams who came in to support specialist clinics. Daily staff meetings were held at the start of each day to discuss any issues affecting service delivery, including staffing levels.

Staff were clear about their roles and responsibilities and how they contributed to patient care as part of a team. Staff worked well together as an effective multidisciplinary team throughout the patient journey. The teams had effective working relationships with each other and with other specialist teams, and all the staff we spoke with reported good teamwork. For example, staff were involved in the ‘Movement Disorder Multi-Disciplinary Clinic’. This clinic brought together multiple disciplines to support patients with conditions such as Parkinson's disease in a one clinic appointment.

The evidence showed a good standard. The service supported people to manage their health and wellbeing to maximise their independence, choice and control. The service supported people to live healthier lives and where possible, reduced their future needs for care and support.

Information was designed to promote healthier lives. This included signposting patients towards healthy eating, losing weight and stopping smoking. Leaflets for each specific clinic were distributed at the relevant clinics by the staff.

People who used services felt supported to manage their own health, care and wellbeing and to maximize their independence.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service routinely monitored people’s care and treatment to continuously improve it. They ensured that outcomes were positive and consistent, and that they met both clinical expectations and the expectations of people themselves.

The maximum number of weeks patients should wait to be seen by a doctor is set by the NHS Constitution to try and make sure people were seen in a time frame that means their medical condition will not get worse while they were waiting. The longest time the Constitution says people should wait is 18 weeks for most non urgent referrals. Risks to people increase the longer they wait. The trust was aware of the risks of follow up backlogs. Data was made available to the different specialities and was monitored; a detailed action plan was monitored weekly for each speciality. A Standard Operating Procedure details what was expected of managers monitoring waiting lists.

The trust had a waiting list above their expected target, though it was generally decreasing each month. In March 2026, their referral to treatment performance within 18 weeks was 68%, slightly exceeding the NHS England target. For those patients waiting more than 52 weeks from referral, this showed an improving picture against NHS England targets.

A detailed action plan was in place for monitoring performance of clinics. The elective performance assurance group coordinated the delivery of the trust wide activities to improve access and performance in regard to referral to treatment times. Standard agenda items included improving the number of patients waiting no longer than 18 weeks for their first appointment.

The Outpatients Services Manager for the trust stated the challenge had been full utilisation of the outpatients at South Bristol Community Hospital for each part of the patients waiting list pathway. Regular meetings were held to discuss any challenges and the ongoing validation of the waiting lists. Non-attendance was 5.9% which was below the national average, this was as a result of the work the trust had been doing to prevent patients from not attending appointments.

The provider monitored the number of cancelled appointments. A monthly review of appointments showed the number of appointments cancelled at the start of March 2026 was 11.3% which was an increase on the previous month. Patient cancellations were running at around 17%.

The provider understood that the waiting lists had significant backlogs. Capacity had been impacted by wasted appointments due to patients not attending, slot utilisation of the clinics and patients finding it difficult to communicate about changes to appointments resulting in them not attending. The trust was aware this impacted on further waiting time standards and on follow up appointments. The trust had a corporate project to improve productivity and efficiency by 10% by March 2027.

The service carried out reviews of the waiting list and had plans to improve performance across the different clinical specialisms.

The evidence showed a good standard. The service told people about their rights around consent and respected these when delivering person-centred care and treatment.

The service had policies and processes to support staff in gaining informed consent. Staff understood and could explain how to gain consent from adults to provide care and treatment. Consent was recorded digitally or at pre-op assessments. There was no monitoring of this available as outpatients did not conduct consent audits. We observed staff explaining the purpose of the appointment, and what to expect during and after the appointment. Patients told us they were ‘given choices’ by clinicians and that everything was explained to them.

Staff understood their responsibilities where a person lacked capacity, though training for nursing staff for patients with dementia awareness was 80%, mandatory training around learning disabilities and consent were both at 100%. The outpatient manager advised translation services were available along with the British Sign Language service. Staff also had access to a communication pack.