- NHS hospital
St Peter's Hospital
Report from 11 November 2024 assessment
Contents
Ratings
Our view of the service
Date of assessment: 11 to 12 March 2025. This was a follow-up assessment following a section 29a Warning Notice in January 2023. We undertook an on-site visit, completed virtual interviews and reviewed data provided by the trust.
St Peters Hospital is in Chertsey, Surrey, and is operated by Ashford and St Peter’s Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.
Maternity services offered midwifery-led care and obstetric care during the antenatal, intrapartum, postnatal and community care.
Services included antenatal clinics, maternity day assessment unit, and the Abbey Birth Centre located on the first floor. The antenatal and postnatal Joan Booker Ward on the 2nd floor and maternity triage, the obstetric-led labour ward, the bereavement suite and maternity theatres were located on the 4th floor.
Elective caesarean sections at this time continued to be completed in the main theatres within the main hospital.
There had been 2,703 births at this service in the last 12 months. With 9.3% of those women and birthing people choosing to give birth in the Abbey Birth Centre, 0.7% giving birth at home and 0.6% giving birth before arrival to hospital.
Data provided by the trust showed, around 18% of local pregnant women and birthing people lived within the top quarter for poverty. With 20% of women and birthing people being from a black, Asian and ethnic minority background and 19% of women did not have English as their first language.
We found improvements during the recent assessment and the trust had mostly met their Section 29a Warning Notice requirements.
We assessed 30 quality statements across the safe, effective, caring, responsive and well-led key questions. Scores from the assessment were combined with ratings and scores from previous inspections to give the rating.
There was a good safety culture where events were investigated, and learning was embedded to promote good practice. Staff provided safe care and treatment, the environment was safe and mostly well maintained. The maternity service had core staff within the day assessment and triage. To ensure staffing levels met the needs of women and birthing people, leaders had introduced assigning staff to their designated maternity area at the start of each shift. Staff delivered good care and treatment following evidence-based practice and women and birthing people had good outcomes. Staff were kind, caring and compassionate. Women and birthing people could access care and treatment when they needed it. The department and staff were well-led by strong leaders who embodied the cultures and values of their workforce. There was improved governance, risk management and culture.
The service was in breach of the legal regulation within safe care and treatment in regard to completing daily checks of emergency equipment.
People's experience of this service
During the onsite assessment, we spoke with women, birthing people and their families and they were positive regarding the care they had received.
The maternity service collected feedback from people using the service through display stands within the maternity areas, QR codes and a text message following discharge. We found feedback on care had improved since our previous inspection and were mostly positive.
Staff were reported to be kind, thoughtful and compassionate to all using the service. People we spoke with expressed they were happy with their care and did not feel anxious about raising concerns.