FOR someone who has just had the health trust she heads slammed once again by the Care Quality Commission, chief executive Michelle McKay remains upbeat.
She points out the CQC’s inspectors visited Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust in April, four months ago, and since then major changes have been put in place.
“This report is from early April so they obviously did not see the level of improvement that the Trust has been able to deliver,” she said.
However she recognised there was still a need to improve the culture of the workplace, focusing on the small issues as well as more strategic points.
“We need to continue to deliver improvements and to let staff know that they can make the difference. People in the front line are in the best place to tell us what to do.”
She said the recent decision by the county’s GPs to back The Future of Acute Hospital Services in Worcestershire was a major boost.
This has released £29million of government money which will pay for three new wards and more parking at the Royal and refurbish the operating theatres at the Alexandra Hospital in Redditch.
“We know that there is capacity at the Alex and we are already looking at which patient groups and services we can move to there.
“The capital works programme will take some time but we will get the new beds placed at the front eend of the project.”
To further ease the pressures on Worcestershire Royal the Trust was also looking at reducing those patients medically fit for discharge but with no onward care package in place.
She described the issue of patient dignity and privacy being compromised as ‘totally unacceptable’ before adding: “We had an inspection by HealthWatch recently and they didn’t really find a problem, and I think what is at issue here is our consistency, the fact that we are not 100 per cent reliable in offering a place of dignity and privacy.”
