Basildon University Hospital

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• Overview
• Person-centred Care
• Care provision, Integration and continuity
• Providing Information
• Listening to and involving people
• Equity in access
• Equity in experiences and outcomes
• Planning for the future

We looked for evidence that children, young people their families and communities were always at the centre of how care was planned and delivered. We checked that the health and care needs of children, young people their families and communities were understood, and they were actively involved in planning care which met these needs. We also looked for evidence that children, young people their families could access care in ways which met their personal circumstances and protected equality characteristics. This is the first assessment for this service. This assessment did not cover all parts of our Assessment Framework; therefore, we did not rate the service, and we have only given scores for those areas which we have assessed. We will carry out future assessments to cover other parts of the Framework and will update our website with our findings. We found that staff and leaders did not always actively listen to information about people who are most likely to experience inequality in experience or outcomes. This meant people’s care was not always tailored in response to this.

We have not awarded this service a score for Responsive.

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

We did not look at Person-centred Care during this assessment. There is no previous rating for the Responsive key question so we cannot yet publish a score for this area.

We did not look at Care provision, Integration and continuity during this assessment. There is no previous rating for the Responsive key question so we cannot yet publish a score for this area.

We did not look at Providing Information during this assessment. There is no previous rating for the Responsive key question so we cannot yet publish a score for this area.

We did not look at Listening to and involving people during this assessment. There is no previous rating for the Responsive key question so we cannot yet publish a score for this area.

We did not look at Equity in access during this assessment. There is no previous rating for the Responsive key question so we cannot yet publish a score for this area.

Staff and leaders did not always listen to information about people who were most likely to experience inequality in experience or outcomes. This meant people’s care was not tailored in response to this.

Families of children and young people with additional needs provided mixed feedback about the care, treatment and support provided by staff. Some parents and carers felt that staff had gone above and beyond, whilst others raised concerns about a lack of reasonable adjustments, feeling that staff did not always listen to them, and feeling that their views were dismissed.

There was limited evidence that the service actively sought out, listened to and responded to information about children and young people who were most likely to experience inequality in experience or outcomes. For example, through feedback from families or through audit activity. There was no parent or child representative on the Children and Young People’s Board. This limited leaders’ ability to identify areas of concern, where action needed to be taken to ensure equity in experience and outcomes.

There were delays in the implementation of recommendations from national guidance relating to children and young people with additional needs. For example, the implementation of national guidance for the early recognition of sepsis in children with learning disabilities, autism and underlying health conditions. This delay in implementing guidance and processes was putting vulnerable children and young people at risk of poor outcomes.

Staff said staffing shortages and demand within the service limited the time they had available to provide support to children and young people with additional needs.
Leaders acknowledged they had work to do around supporting children and families with additional needs while in the PED. They had set up a working group to review and improve the reasonable adjustments in place for children and young people living with autism. The working group had set up an action plan and was in the process of working through this at the time of our assessment.

Healthwatch had been contacted by people with concerns over how children with additional needs were not always receiving the necessary support and care.

The trust was not able to provide evidence that they were monitoring any delays in accessing the interpretation or translation service or the number of occasions where this service was requested by staff but could not be provided. However, the trust stated they would be withdrawing the contract from the previous interpretation and translation provider due to them not meeting service needs.

Children attending PED had access to a play specialist 6 days a week during daytime hours.

We did not look at Planning for the future during this assessment. There is no previous rating for the Responsive key question so we cannot yet publish a score for this area.