Northampton General Hospital

Ratings

• Overall

  Requires improvement

• Safe

  Requires improvement

• Well-led

  Requires improvement

Our view of the service

Northampton General Hospital provides general acute services for a population of 426,500 in West Northamptonshire.

Northampton General Hospital NHS Trust provide critical care services at Northampton General Hospital for patients requiring Level 2 and Level 3 care including a general Intensive Care Unit (ICU), and critical care outreach. The new CCU opened on June 29, 2022. The CCU has 16 specialist beds of which five are isolation rooms fitted with clean air technology designed to prevent the spread of illnesses and support patients with immune issues.

CCU care is staffed by a team of more than 150 multi-disciplinary staff who provide one-to-one, or sometimes two-to-one, care for patients and their families, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

Patients are nursed on the unit for short-stay episodes, but some remaining on the unit for a lot longer, up to 100 days. Many of these journeys involve lengthy specialist rehabilitation before patients are able to leave.

The critical care outreach team provides a Trust-wide service to all adult wards, providing support for all staff caring for at risk, acutely and critically ill patients. The team is also responsible for following up patients after discharge from the CCU to optimise their recovery. The service sees and cares for patients who are very ill or at risk of becoming very ill requiring close observation, monitoring and life support.