Chief Executive's Blog
Welcome to the Chief Executive's Blog. I hope it will offer an
interesting insight into the running of this Trust and the issues
the Board and I face. I look forward to using the blog as a way of
keeping staff, patients, visitors and members of the public
regularly informed and as a simple method to receive feedback from
you all.
If you have any comments about the below blog entries or would
like to get in touch with me, please feel free to send me an
email from the the Contact Us page of the website and select
'Chief Exec's Blog' on the subject drop-down menu.
03/01/12
Visit from the Secretary of State for Health, Andrew
Lansley
On Christmas Eve I was pleased to host a visit from the
Secretary of State for Health, Andrew Lansley. I am very proud of
the team here at the Countess and was delighted to be able to
introduce some of them to the Secretary of State, including
clinical staff in the Emergency Department, Children's Unit and
Ward 33.
While Mr Lansley was here, Dr Kausik Chatterjee took the
opportunity to demonstrate our state of the art telemedicine
service which was the first in the North West and is giving stroke
patients a better chance of full recovery.
Mr Lansley told me he was very impressed with the high level of
patient care that people at the Countess of Chester Hospital
receive and paid tribute to all the hard work of the staff who are
providing care for people over the Christmas period.
02/12/11
Respect and professionalism on day of action
Wednesday 30th November saw approximately two million
UK public sector workers strike - in protest to the Government's
proposed changes to public sector pensions.
Prior to the strike the Trust worked closely with unions to
ensure that patient care was to be unaffected by any industrial
action as our patient's safety is always our main priority. It was
the Trust's objective to give employees the freedom and opportunity
to support the day of action if they so wished, whilst also
maintaining an excellent level of care to our patients by
putting plans in place to deal with any disruption that may have
been caused by the industrial action.
I am pleased to say that the combined efforts of our staff and
the dignified way that supporters of the day of action conducted
themselves, allowed the Trust to cope well on the day.
Thank you to everyone for the way this important day was dealt
with on all counts.
Alzheimer's Society here every Wednesday
The Countess and the Alzheimer's Society are working together to
offer help and advice to anyone who is affected by dementia.
The Alzheimer's Society now hosts an information stand at the
hospital's main entrance every Wednesday between 2.30-3.30pm where
volunteers who have first-hand experience of Alzheimer's will be on
hand to provide information and advice to anyone who is affected or
even just interested in the condition.
Join in the Santa Dash
I'm looking forward to taking part in the upcoming Santa Dash
with my dogs Hugo and Ted. It is set to be a brilliant festive
fundraising event and there over 1,200 walkers taking part.
The Santa Dash takes place on Sunday 11th December
and it's open to all ages. Children aged 14 and under can enter the
Santa Dash so long as they are accompanied by an adult.
You can find out more or sign up by visiting in the Fundraising
section of the website or by clicking
here.
25/10/11
Trust with the prestigious UNICEF Baby Friendly
Award
Coronation Street actor Ian Puleston-Davies - who plays Owen in
the popular soap - visited the Countess on Tuesday 25th
October to present the Trust with the prestigious UNICEF Baby
Friendly Award.
The Trust's Maternity Unit has been externally audited by UNICEF
UK as part of a three-stage assessment and has achieved the Baby
Friendly Initiative Award. Of the 32 hospitals in the North West
only 10 are fully accredited with this prestigious award, putting
the Countess among a select group of top performing Trusts.
The Baby Friendly Initiative is a worldwide programme of the World Health Organization and
UNICEF. It was established in 1992 to encourage
maternity hospitals to implement the Ten
Steps to Successful Breastfeeding and to practise in accordance
with the International Code of Marketing
of Breast Milk Substitutes.
The Baby Friendly Initiative works with the health care system
to ensure a high standard of care for pregnant women and
breastfeeding mothers and babies. Support is provided for health
care facilities that are seeking to implement recognised standards
of best practice in the care of mothers and babies, an assessment
and accreditation process recognises those that have achieved the
required standard.
Congratulations to all the staff.
Chester MP opens Emergency Dept.
Majors Refurbishment
On Friday, I was pleased to be present as our local MP, Stephen
Mosley, officially opened the new refurbished Majors area in the
Emergency Department, usually referred to as A and E. Having spent
some time in the department back in August Stephen is familiar with
the incredible work that goes on every day and paid tribute to the
staff in his speech.
The refurbishment forms part of a two million pound investment
programme for Emergency Medicine and has improved the environment
for patient care and for staff, added three cubicles and increased
the resuscitation patient capacity from two to three.
Press Coverage for Standards of Care for
the Elderly Report
Last week, there was a great deal of coverage on the news and in
the media of a report by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) that
"Hospitals in England are falling short in the most basic care they
are giving elderly patients". The story was based on unannounced
visits by the Care Quality Commission at 100 hospitals to assess
dignity and nutrition standards which identified some real
problems; however the Countess was awarded the highest compliance
category possible for meeting essential quality and safety
standards for older people.
I posted this on my blog back in May, just after our unannounced
visit.
"All of the patients who inspectors talked to said their needs
were met and that they were given information and encouraged to
take part in drawing up their plan of care and felt confident that
if they didn't understand anything they could ask for further
explanation."
"I am extremely pleased with the Trust's performance and this
indicates the excellent standard of care provided to patients. We
aim to treat every single patient as an individual with respect and
dignity, as well as catering for basic needs and requirements.
Thanks to the effort of our staff, this report demonstrates that we
are among the best Trusts in the country for providing such
care."
Annual Members' Meeting
On Wednesday 4th October, we hosted our Annual Members' Meeting
in the Lecture Hall of the Education & Training Centre. This
year we saw a record turnout, with 102 members and members of the
public taking advantage of the opportunity to hear presentations
from the Chairman, Medical Director, Finance Director our auditors
KPMG and of course, myself.
Everyone in attendance also had the opportunity to ask questions
of the Board and we answered some challenging questions. The
Countess is here to serve our local population and the Annual
Member's Meeting is a great way for local people to understand more
and get involved.
The dates of all our public meetings are published on our
website.
Finance Department shortlisted for HSJ
Award
The Financial Management Department has been shortlisted for the
inaugural Health Service Journal's Efficiency Awards, for their
work on Zero Based Budgeting in the Efficiency in Financial
Services category.
Representatives from the department presented to the panel of
judges which included David Flory - Department of Health Deputy NHS
Chief Executive and answered questions on why we embarked on the
Project, the challenges we faced and how we overcame them in such a
short period of time.
In the current economic climate, a sound financial footing is
essential for us to continue providing the best possible care to
the residents of Chester, Cheshire, Ellesmere Port and Flintshire.
The winner will be announced on Wednesday 14th September so fingers
crossed!
15/08/11
Chester's MP spends time with frontline
staff
Last week, Chester's MP Stephen Mosley spent the week at the
Hospital learning how healthcare is delivered on the frontline. I
was delighted that Stephen was able to join us to see the amazing
work that staff here do every day to deliver the best possible care
to our patients. Stephen spent time with Porters, Cleaners, Cooks,
Nurses and Doctors and he went away very impressed with what he
saw.
Emergency Department Investment
Programme
We have just seen our first glimpse of our refurbished Emergency
Department. It forms part of a two million pound investment
programme for the department and will add three cubicles to the
majors area and increase the resuscitation patient capacity from
two to three.
It is great to see that even in the challenging financial
situation in which we are working we are able to invest in
improving our facilities to ensure we are providing our patients
with the best possible care.
Non-Executive Director
vacancies
We are currently advertising for two Non-Executive Director
positions. Non-Execs play a key role in moving our organisation
forward; developing strategies, providing challenge and assuring
quality by working alongside other Non-Executives and Executive
DIrectors as equal members of the board. They share responsibility
with the other Directors for the decisions made by the board and
for the success of the organisation in leading the local
improvement of healthcare services.
This is an interesting and challenging time for the NHS and I am
looking forward to meeting applicants for the posts.
Consultation on proposals for a new
Trust name
We are currently in the process of a twelve week consultation to
hear what people think about our proposals to change the name of
the Trust. Countess of Chester Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
manages services provided both in the hospital and other settings.
The word 'hospital' in the name of the Trust does not fully reflect
the full range of care and services we provide and can cause
confusion when services are provided elsewhere, such as at
Ellesmere Port Hospital. Removing the word 'hospital' from the name
of the Trust would help us to further develop our services in the
future, caring for patients in other geographical areas without
being constrained by the geographical restrictions of our Trust
name. Examples of other Trusts that have removed the word
'hospital' from their Trust name include The Christie, Royal
Marsden, Salford Royal and Royal Bolton Hospital.
If you want to find out more about the proposals or contribute
to the consultation, please use the red link on the homepage of the
website. The consultation is open until August 31st 2011.
31/05/11
Meeting essential dignity and nutrition
standards for older people
A report by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) has awarded the
Trust with the highest compliance category possible for meeting
essential quality and safety standards for older people.
All of the patients who inspectors talked to said their needs
were met and that they were given information and encouraged to
take part in drawing up their plan of care and felt confident that
if they didn't understand anything they could ask for further
explanation.
I am extremely pleased with the Trust's performance and this
indicates the excellent standard of care provided to patients. We
aim to treat every single patient as an individual with respect and
dignity, as well as catering for basic needs and requirements.
Thanks to the effort of our staff, this report demonstrates that we
are among the best Trusts in the country for providing such
care.
40Top Hospital for the eleventh year in
a row
I am pleased to report that the Trust has received a 40Top
Hospitals Award for the eleventh year in succession, one of only
five Trusts in the country to achieve this. The awards have only
been in existence for eleven years meaning that the Countess has
successfully received the award every year since it was established
in 2001.
As well as individual awards for patient safety, quality of care
and data quality, CHKS celebrates excellence amongst its clients
across the UK with the 40Top Awards. These are based on the
evaluation of 21 key performance indicators covering safety,
clinical effectiveness, health outcomes, efficiency, patient
experience and quality of care.
In a difficult year of change and financial pressure we have
still been recognised nationally as a top performing hospital.
The Trust's Medical Director, Dr Virginia Clough paid tribute to
the hard work put in by all members of staff at the Countess and
said that of particular pleasure has been our sustained success in
tackling Healthcare Associated Infections. The fact that we have
not had a single case of MRSA Bacteraemia since June 2010 is one of
our many achievements in the past year.
Duke of Westminster opens unit for
parents
His Grace the Duke of Westminster visited the Countess recently
to open a newly refurbished facility for parents of sick children
being treated on the Children's Unit.
The Duke was accompanied by me, Sir Jim Sharples, along with
many members of staff and members of the community to see the
opening of Christopher Wing.
Christopher Wing was originally opened in 1998 following the
tireless fundraising of Tim and Gill Worrall. The wing was named
after Mr and Mrs Worrall's son Christopher, who sadly died in 1994
of a brain tumour while being treated on the Children's Ward.
Since its initial opening, the wing has required further
modernisation and improvements and the Chester Childbirth Appeal
recently donated almost £90,000 towards refurbishing it. It was
refurbished in response to feedback from parents who suggested that
parent accommodation and facilities needed to be improved. Space
was made available through the refurbishment, it was made more
easily accessible and welcoming, and the overall facilities in the
kitchens and bathrooms have been completely modernised. A 'Quiet
Room' was also built for counselling parents and for breaking
sensitive news in private.
We were very grateful to His Grace the Duke of Westminster for
sparing the time from his busy schedule to come and open the
Christopher Wing and the opening event was a great success.
14/03/11
Breast Screening Unit Opening
Event
On Friday, our Breast Screening Unit held an opening event to
promote the changes that have been taking place recently, including
the complete transfer to digital imaging for breast screening.
I am very proud that The Ursula Keys Breast Screening Unit is
among one of the first breast screening units in Cheshire and
Merseyside to make a complete changeover from analogue to digital
imaging, exceeding the standards set by the Department of Health
for the NHS by the end of 2010.
Joe Gildea, of the Ship Victory Pub, whose fundraising efforts
in recent years have helped to raise over £80,000 for the Breast
Care Unit, was the guest of honour at the opening.
New Macmillan Centre taking
shape
It is great to see the progress being made on the build of the
new Macmillan Centre located off the main corridor of the
hospital.
Once completed, the centre will enable the Macmillan Service to
help anyone affected by cancer including patients, their family and
carers, and people who have completed their treatment.
Car Parking Consultation
I am pleased to see that we have already had a good number of
responses to our current consultation on car parking charges at the
Countess. Our current charge of £2.50 per visit has been in place
for two years and this consultation is an opportunity to give us
your views on the best way forward and how we could make the scheme
fairer or better.
The parking charge pays for barrier entry and exit, 24 hour
manned security and CCTV coverage. Any surplus from the parking
charges goes into general hospital funds which can be used for any
of the costs associated with running the hospital, including
medical staff, equipment, buildings and other elements of patient
care.
The consultation is open until 13th May 2011, and I would
encourage anyone to contribute their views.
Newspaper Reports on jobs at risk at the
Countess
A report has recently been published claiming that 461 jobs are
at risk at the Countess. Such statements clearly cause worry for
staff, so I wrote an open letter to all staff in the Trust
explaining the following:
Firstly, the Board have no plans to cut 461 posts in this
Trust.
Like every NHS organisation, we do need to make substantial
savings over the next few years. For us, this means we need to save
£6-7m per year over three years. We have been running a programme
to reduce waste and improve efficiency in all areas of the Trust
and we have been working closely with front line staff to identify
areas where we can improve.
This programme has been running for a year already and has
delivered over £6m of saving so far. In this time, the number of
staff employed by the Trust has reduced by approximately 60. This
has mainly happened due to retirements, MARS and natural turnover.
Only one member of staff has been made redundant. At the same time,
the number of nurses working on wards has actually gone up.
We are committed to ensuring that patient care is not
compromised and one of the key aims of the programme is to
transform the way we deliver services to improve patient care.
As things change over the next few years, we will no doubt need
fewer members of staff. I have previously gone on record as saying
that my fellow Board members and I will do everything we can to
avoid compulsory redundancies and that promise remains.
This is the biggest financial challenge the Trust has ever had
to face after the growth in funding the NHS has seen over recent
years. We can meet the challenge by thinking radically and
innovatively.
31/01/11
Thank you for your help
The Countess, like all hospitals in the North West region,
recently experienced increased admissions due to winter pressures
and influenza.
In order to reduce the risk of patients and staff becoming ill,
for a short time we asked the public to not visit the hospital
unless it was absolutely essential and we limited visitors to two
per patient. These were precautionary measures that were introduced
to protect the well-being of patients and staff. Our Medical
Director, Dr Virginia Clough, recently appeared on BBC Radio
Merseyside to emphasise this message.
I understand the inconvenience that this caused to people who
wanted to visit poorly friends and relatives, but patient safety is
always our number one priority.
We made the decision to not put in place any formal visiting
restrictions - the measures we introduced were simply an appeal to
the public to assist us and you did just that. With that in mind I
would like to thank everyone for their co-operation and assistance
at a time when we really needed it.
17/01/11
People's choice award
I was delighted to hear that in addition to the Project of the
Year award, the Countess has also won the Lean Healthcare Academy
People's Choice Award.
The People's Choice Award was independently voted upon by
everyone who took part in the award process and is recognition of
an outstanding achievement by the Transformation Programme
team.
Our award submission detailed the pathway redesign work which
embraces 'lean' and clinical transformation tools and techniques to
deliver reductions in patient length of stay, reduction in rework ,
improving patient and staff experience and fundamentally releasing
time to care. Work started within both Emergency Respiratory and
Elective Orthopaedic pathways and is now being rolled out across
other clinical and non-clinical areas.
I am looking forward to making further progress and achieving
even more in 2011.
Santa stroll a hit again
On the 5th December, hundreds of fundraisers supported our
annual Santa Stroll and it proved to be a great success yet
again.
More people than ever took part in the 5km walk, raising over
£5,000 with a record number of walkers joining in.
The event again raised funds for the Relative Comfort Appeal,
which will offer accommodation and counselling rooms for relatives
and loved ones of critically ill patients, although some walkers
also raised money for the Breast Care Unit and the Special Care
Baby Unit.
This event has grown in popularity each year and it is a
fantastic way of raising money for a worthy cause. Thank you to
everyone who took part.