Follow-up inspection finds there’s still room for improvement at Western General
The Healthcare Environment Inspectorate (HEI) has published its report following an unannounced follow-up inspection visit to the Western General Hospital on Tuesday 26 and Wednesday 27 May – and further improvement is required before the local hospital can be given a clean bill of health.
HEI, part of Healthcare Improvement Scotland, was set up to help reduce healthcare associated infection risk to patients through a rigorous inspection framework.
The HEI inspection team examined NHS Lothian’s self-assessment information and then inspected the hospital to validate this information, meet patients and staff, and visit wards and departments to assess how clean the hospital was and if it was meeting national standards.
This follow-up report should be read along with the previous report produced last November, as May’s inspection follows up on the requirements made at that inspection. (See NEN blog post 26 January ‘Simply Unacceptable’).
Inspectors found that the NHS board has met six of the requirements made at the previous inspection in November last year, and partially met two other requirements.
This latest inspection resulted in no new requirements or recommendations.
Jacqui Macrae, HEI’s Head of Quality of Care, said: “Our inspectors found that NHS Lothian has met six of the eight requirements we made in our previous inspection. Progress has been made in addressing the remaining two requirements but these have only been partially met.
“As a result, NHS Lothian must take further action to maintain a clean environment in the acute receiving admissions unit. It must also ensure that a consistent system is in place to check all mattresses across all wards and departments.
These requirements will be carried forward to the next inspection and we expect NHS Lothian to address these areas as a matter of priority.”
The full HEI inspection report can be found at: http://www.